


§§? 








^E 


[// 


Y/7 


%dM^ 





^^^.*??^77\^^\n 



LFBBAgY OF CONGRESS. 

j 6i|ap — - inp^rtg^l If a.- 

Shelf ^ :.. 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 





'[ W / ({ \V/7/ \\ /([ V 


l^^^B 



, ) A \\ ))/6v\ V/Ji )) Z\\ \l/yk 



\^ 



^: 







m 


)a 


\s^n 




Mm 


: /. 


i^L 







/ ( \ 


B 


§ 




Wh 


Mli 


H 







,\\ l/j^i Xl/^A ))X \\ I j 



SUNDAY MEDITATIONS 



AND 



SELECTED PROSE SKETCHES. 



BY 

DONN PIATT, 

Author of "Memories of the Men who Saved the Union," "The Lone Grave of the 

Shryiandoah, and Other Tales," "The Rev. Melancthon Poundex," 

"Poems and Plays," etc. 



CINCINNATI: 

Robert Clarke & Co., Publishers. 

1893. 



n>y/ 



1 






Copyright, 1893, 
By ELLA KIRBY PIATT. 




LC Control Number 




tmp96 027696 



CONTENTS 



PAGE. 

Sunday Medit \tions — 

Preface v 

Searching for the Truth 21 

Natural and Revealed Religion 32 

Cheerfulness a Duty 38 

The Courage that Suffers 45 

The Giving of Alms 52 

The Poor in Spirit 59 

Pity for the Fallen 66 

What we Owe to Woman 74 

The Casting Out of Devils 80 

Good One Day in Seven 87 

The Need of Faith. . 94 

Confession of Sin 100 

The Love of the Beautiful 105 

Blind by the Wayside ■ Ill 

The Love of Children 118 

Respectable Christians 124 

The First of Democrats 132 

Love for Our Fellow-men 139 

Unjust Stewards 146 . 

Son, Give Me Thy Heart 154 

The Wonders of Nature 162 

Avarice and Hypocrisy 167 

Man's Intellect 174 

Selected Prose Sketches — 

A Tribute to an Humble Friend 180 

Little Christy's Christmas 190 

The Worries that Kill 206 

Humors of the War 214 

Churchyard Reveries 223 

(Hi) 



MBH 



iv Contents. 

PAGE. 

The World's Grumblers 235 

The Shaw in London 245 

Our Inventive Cranks 255 

Prorogation of Parliament 264 

The Whig Party on its Travels 371 

Berkeley Springs 282 

Our Fever for Titles 290 

The Death Penalty 295 

The Dude in Literature , 300 

Vacant Pews and Worried Pulpits 306 

Revenue Tariff, a Tax ; Protective Tariff, Extortion 314 

The Kingdom of Satan 323 

Murmurs of the Mac-o-chee , 329 

Celebrated Men of the Day — 

Washington McLean -. 348 

Robert Cumming Schenck 370 

Henry Ward Beecher 388 

Roscoe Conkling 400 

Charles Stewart Parnell 411 

James A. Garfield 418 

Richard Realf 431 



PREFACE. 



The Christian mind of to-day, as it has been in 
the immediate past, is much disturbed by the claim 
of so-called science. This means that through cer- 
tain intellectual processes and discoveries Christian- 
ity is found to be erroneous and without the founda- 
tion of fact that should give dignity and power to its 
existence. 

The church, in its effort to tranquilize the troub- 
led mind, has committed the error found in an at- 
tempt to harmonize the two — the so-called science 
and itself. There is not an intelligent mind on 
either side that does not recognize the futility of this 
attempt. They can not be reconciled. If it were 
left to what we are pleased to call the learning of the 
world, we would be not only without a recognition of 
God and life hereafter, but taught to disown both. 
We may as well face this fact at once. We gain 
nothing — indeed we lose — by shrinking from or at- 
tempting to blind ourselves to the true aim. We are 
conscious of God as we are conscious of sunlight, 

(v) 



vi Preface. 

and when we attempt to give one born blind a 
knowledge of light we are precisely in the same 
condition as when we seek to make God evident 
through human reason. Through all the ages of re- 
corded and unrecorded past of humanity in all parts 
of the peopled earth, no human being has ever been, 
or can be, found who did not or does not feel within 
himself the existence of a Maker. This is born in 
us ; it can not be obliterated, however much through 
boasted human reason it may be distorted. 

In the same way each mortal is conscious of a 
part of himself that thinks, wills, and remembers — 
that is distinct, separate, apart, and superior to the 
matter upon, which and through which it acts. Our 
poor little processes of thought, dignified with the 
name of science, give this a name, and call it mind; 
the servants of our holy church call it soul ; but 
the name throws no additional light on the fact. 
It begins, continues, and ends in the consciousness of 
its existence. In the same way, but not with the 
same strength, we recognize life hereafter. The " I 
am " of the immediate second is the " I the am " of 
the next second. I know that I exist, I know that 
I shall continue to exist, and such knowledge comes 
from no subtle process of thought. Thought helps 
us to nothing. One step beyond the inner conscious- 
ness and we are in utter darkness. 



Preface. vii 

Philosophy, the vaunted philosophy of the schools, 
which means a knowledge of the fact and the reason 
for it, is a delusion. We have the fact, but the rea- 
son, or the power to comprehend the reason, has not 
been given us by our Creator, and therefore has no 
existence. I ask the learned man what is light, and 
he answers sadly that he does not know. The blade 
of grass at his learned feet is as much a mystery as 
the depths of space info which science drops its little 
pack-thread of measurement and solemnly makes 
record. It is not necessary to climb painfully to the 
outer verge of our little knowledge and gaze into 
boundless space to have our boasted reason reel back 
into insanity. 

The humblest thing about us brings the same 
result. Why, I do not know myself; I know only 
that I exist , I think, I will, I remember, and there 
it ends. How, then, are we to know God's works ? 
"We have the science of astronomy that begins and 
ends with an enumeration of a few worlds of unend- 
ing space that are as atoms to the whole. We have 
the science of geology that digs painfully into the 
mere skin of our little world, and from it measures 
epochs. Back of the geologist, with his little ham- 
mer, lie the countless ages — the ages that had no 
beginning — and before him countless ages again; and 
in this line, as in limitless space, our poor science dis- 



viii Preface. 

appears. Small wonder, then, that the dim-eyed, 
heart- sick sage of science at the close of life says, 
mournfully : " I end where I began, and all my years 
of study have only taught me that I know nothing." 

The difference between the extremes, educated 
and uneducated ignorance, is that the one believes 
there is knowledge, and the other knows that none 
exists. The height of all human knowledge is to 
know that we know nothing. 

What an error, then, it is for the ministers of our 
holy church to accept the pretense and attempt to 
harmonize religion and science. This is lamentable, 
but it becomes pitiable when a minister of God ac- 
cepts the challenge of a scientist as to the existence 
of God or the truths of religion. He passes from the 
altar to the rostrum, from the presence of Christ to 
the man-created idol of wisdom, and accepting the 
promises offered by infidelity suffers necessarily de- 
feat amid the ribald jeers and laughter of fiends in 
human shape. 

The first offense was eating the fruit of the for- 
bidden tree of knowledge as it grows on earth. Our 
latest crime is canning that fruit, under a supposed 
sanction of the church, for common use." 

Our blessed Savior appeared on earth, not to 
teach us scientific truths we can not comprehend, 
but to appeal to the better nature of humanity as 



Preface. ix 

God made it, and so render us fit for the life eternal 
that lies beyond the grave. All He taught was so 
simple and so clear that a child can comprehend. It 
appeals to what is in us and lifts our instincts them- 
selves into an intellectual guidance. To love one 
another, to be charitable to the poor and afflicted, to 
be just in our dealings and to love God, calls for no 
study by the midnight lamp or feeble groping amid 
the works of the Creator. The little space given life 
on earth can well be spent in preparing ourselves for 
the promised life beyond the grave. 

The worst result of all this learned craze is that 
found in what we are pleased to call popular educa- 
tion. Education, of course, means that development 
of the mind which gives the largest and most satisfac- 
tory results of thinking. In the popular course it 
means a mere cultivation of the memory, through 
which great stores of facts may be accumulated. 
Education, in its true significance, is applicable to a 
few minds only, and those few differ so radically 
that no two are alike as to either quality or char- 
acter. 

The popular belief is that all are alike, and 
through one system the common run of minds may 
be lifted to the same level. Memory is common to 
all, and therefore memory is appealed to and used in 
a vast accumulation of facts. 



x Preface. 

The process is not only unintellectual but fatal 
to the little mind left us upon which to accumulate 
the so-called information. The training of the intel- 
lectual faculties is not unlike that of the body. A 
man is given a tool, or a set of tools, and trained to 
their use. What, then, is- the good of a shop full 
of tools to a man who can not use one, and what is 
the good of a congressional library to the man who 
can not utilize a single fact therein recorded? A 
mere cultivation of the natural or instinctive memory 
fails to give the necessary use ; on the contrary, it 
destroys the power to use. 

To understand this, it is necessary to know what 
the natural or instinctive memory is. It is based on 
association. The mind is to its surroundings what 
the plate of the photographer is to the objects 
brought before it, save that instead of a separate 
picture there is a succession of pictures connected 
one with the other by what is called association. 
Through every healthy, natural mind there floats 
continuously a succession of images, and one seems 
to suggest that which succeeds. Thus it is rain, the 
rain suggests a flood, the flood the ocean, the ocean 
the English navy, the English navy the bombard- 
ment of Alexandria. 

When this flow of images held together by asso- 
ciation is arrested and the mind dwells on one, or 



Preface. xi 

when it is confined to a few and the flow seems to be 
an eddy from which the mind can not escape, it is 
called insane. 

This is disease, and onr so-called common edu- 
cation brings it on. 

The first lesson taught through educational 
training is that there is no logical sequence between 
the image presented and that suggested. Take the 
example given. There is no logical connection of 
the rain and the ocean. The thoughtful mind real- 
izes this when asked what relation there is between 
the rain and the bombardment of Alexandria. In 
fact, there is no logical sequence in any of the steps 
that led from rain to the bombardment. 

As we strengthen the mind, then, we weaken 
and eventually destroy the instinct. A mere mem- 
ory is a mark of a weak mind. It is on this account 
that children, women, and negroes learn — as it is 
called — more readily than the more thoughtful. As 
the natural memory is broken up, the logical mem- 
ory has to take its place. Those things only are re- 
tained that have a logical connection. As there are 
but one in a hundred thousand capable of this, we 
can readily appreciate where our popular education 
is left. 

The public instructors having a glimmering sense 
of this difficult task are continually striving to de- 



xii Preface. 

stroy the natural memory, and, believing that all 
are capable of a like elevation through training, 
fetch about the same result that comes from disease. 
The nearer level of mind in the unfortunate pupils 
may afford enough to break in on the natural mem- 
ory, but have not sufficient to replace with the logical 
or acquired memory — hence insanity. 

The ordinary result, however, is a cultivation to 
an abnormal condition of the natural memory and a 
consequent weakening of the intellect. If this were 
the only evil we might submit to it, but a worse re- 
mains. This unnatural training of the memory 
through all sorts of stimulants of competition, re- 
wards and punishments destroys the nervous system. 
It not only fills the land with educated idiots, but 
with invalids as well. That child that should be on a 
farm or in a work-shop getting health from reasona- 
ble labor, is not only shut in a hot school-room, de- 
prived of natural exercise and pure air for hours 
every day, that would kill an adult, but carries home 
a load of books to continue far into the night the 
death dealing process. 

All the tender joys of home, so dear to the mem- 
ory in after life, are disturbed; all the moral influ- 
ences that grow from the hearth-stone are destroyed 
to satisfy this Moloch of education. From the home 
comes all the good upon which not the state alone, 



Preface. xiii 

but social life exists and prospers, and tbe home is 
wrecked. The state takes the child from its parents 
and of consequence the citizen from the church, that a 
popular superstition may be cherished, and the result 
is, after a century's experience, that insanity doubles 
upon us every ten years, while crime is such that the 
question is no longer what are we to do with our 
criminals, but what will the criminals do with us. 

What else could we expect? Admitting for a 
moment that education elevates and culture refines, 
have we found the education, are we getting the cul- 
ture? The fountain never rises above its head, and 
the crude, coarse machinery we look to as an educa- 
tional process grinds out only what it is capable of 
grinding. The mind is recognized as the most subtle, 
delicate and important part of us, easily disarranged 
and difficult to care for, and yet we turn this over to 
the stupid pedagogue who is capable of teaching pre- 
cisely in proportion as he is incapable of other pur- 
suit. Does sane mind carry his watch to a black- 
smith for repair? And yet a machine, as we have 
said, the most delicate that comes from the Creator, 
is given to a worse than blacksmith to hammer upon. 

The common schools are worse than Godless; 
they are idolatrous, for 'the false god worshiped is 
memory. The tender, youthful victims offered yearly 
upon the altar of this mumbo-jumbo make life in the 



xiv Preface. 

interior of Africa or on the Cannibal Islands 
Christian and respectable. 

The Christian faith was not born of human 
knowledge, and is not dependent on that wisdom 
which comes of the intellectual processes. It was 
made part of us when we were first created, is there- 
fore an element in our nature, and while it may be 
disturbed can not be destroyed, any more than the 
action of our lungs, the circulation of our blood, or 
any other function necessary to our physical exist- 
ence. None know this better than the truly taught. 
All knowledge, when truly analyzed and sifted down, 
means merely giving a name to something that we 
can not comprehend. 

An event, when first recognized, is called a phe- 
nomenon ; when repeated, it is styled a coincidence; 
when it occurs a third time it is entitled a law, and 
as such is duly labeled and put to record. Its cause, 
nature and effect are all alike unknown and unknow- 
able. When, for example, Sir Isaac Newton called 
attention to the fact that ail bodies fell to the earth, 
and entitled the continued occurrence the law of 
gravitation, the learned apes in spectacles gravely 
nodded their hairless skulls and cried, " Great mind, 
learned man ; wonderful progress of science !" And 
yet what has become of this fact, so simplified as sup- 
posed by Newton, among the savants themselves? 



Preface. xv 

Newton himself, in his well known letter to Berkely, 
recognized the absurdity of the supposed explana- 
tion found in the name by admitting the impossibil- 
ity of such a law acting through a vacuum, and at- 
tempted an explanation by supposing all space to be 
filled with ether, as if that helped to understand what 
remains to-day an impenetrable mystery. The latest 
heard upon this subject came from a discussion be- 
fore the Berlin Physical Society, when two eminent 
scientists, known to the learned world as Professor 
Paul Du Bois-Reymond and Professor Yon Helm- 
holtz, agreed that gravity was simply incomprehen- 
sible, but that it is an " inherent property " of matter. 

" Why is it, Professor," asked a student of the 
late astronomer Yaughn, who starved to death at Cin- 
cinnati, "that the sun is said to be the source of light, 
yet as we leave the earth and approach that great 
source we pass into outer darkness and cold ?" 

" My son," was the sad reply, " If you can tell 
me what light and heat are, I will solve your diffi- 
culty." 

The latest fad, to use an expressive cant word, 
among these dealers in scientific mysteries, is evolu- 
tion. Invented by the imaginative mind of Darwin, 
it was so improved on by the more logical intellect of 
Herbert Spencer, as to mean quite another thing from 
that intended by its inventor, and is to-day so shadowy 



xvi Preface. 

and uncertain that no two of the learned pundits can 
be found agreeing upon the precise definition. It 
differs from gravitation in one remarkable feature, 
and that is, that while gravitation is a name given to 
a continuously occurring event, which, whether we 
comprehend it or not, seems a fact ; evolution, on the 
contrary, is the creature of pure speculation. It 
serves its purpose, however, and solves all doubt in 
the mind of its believer by the mere use of the word. 
When one of these aged phrase-eaters, of recognized 
scientific attainments, utters that magic Word, an aw- 
ful silence of submissive humility follows, as a grove 
of little singers becomes mute when a fog obscures 
the sun. 

How little learning has done for humanity a 
slight investigation will demonstrate. The sum total 
progress is to be found in material existence. 
Through the control and manipulation of matter 
some of us — a small minority — are better sheltered, 
fed, and cared for than were our ancestors. Are we 
happier, more moral, or in better health than were 
our barbarous progenitors ? Alas ! no. Nicely ad- 
justed machinery, driven by harnessed steam, may 
pick up and carry us at the rate of sixty or a hun- 
dred miles an hour. Has it carried us from our sor- 
rows, sickness, and evil impulses? No, again. These 
are with us more positively secure than our epito- 



Preface. xvii 

mized worldly goods checked in the baggage cars. 
Antiquarians tell us of cave-dwellers among oar remote 
ancestors, who were cannibals, and sucked the mar- 
row from the stone-broken bones of their fellow-men. 
The cannibals of to-day have their caves gilded with 
gold and graced with silken drapery. They live on 
champagne and canvasbacks,£>dtede/oze gras and ter- 
rapin, within walls so thick that they can not hear 
the moans of dying and cries of starving men, the 
marrow of whose bones they have sucked out, each 
cannibal absorbing the living of thousands. 

Man is to-day what man was thousands of years 
ago. Alongside the palace stands the penitentiary, 
the poor-house, and the asylum for the insane. 
Hovels multiply and crime grows bolder and more 
aggressive. " I knew I had struck a civilized land," 
said a ship-wrecked mariner, " for I encountered a 
gallows on the coast." That ghastly remnant of bar- 
barism is the one great distinguishing feature of civ- 
ilized life. 

From this dark and depressing view of how little 
learning has done for humanity, we turn with glad 
hearts to that which, if it has not lessened our sor- 
rows or lifted us above sickness, has enabled us to 
bear both with a hopeful recognition of a relief here- 
after — a relief that is to come from our own recog- 
nition of our better selves. " That is all a delusion," 
2 



xviii Preface. 

cries the agnostic, who, professing to know nothing, 
claims to know all. " Your miracles on which you 
base your belief in the divinity of Christ will not 
bear the test of evidence. These so-called gospels 
are fictions, and all your Christ taught was known to 
the world long before He was born." 

Woe waits the poor believer who turns to dis- 
pute such questions as these. This learned agnostic, 
who measures God's creation with his little pack- 
thread, and gives nature's mysteries which he can 
not comprehend learned names, and' so disposes of 
them, will make short work with the evidences of 
Christianity based on the so-called laws of human 
evidence. If the agnostic were called on to prove, 
through such process, the existence of his cherished 
gravitation, he would be as much at a loss as the 
poor Christian challenged to demonstrate the divin- 
ity of our Savior. If our faith is not in us, there 
is no intellectual efforts that will put it there ; if it is 
in us, no such process will rob us of its blessed pos- 
session. 

Putting aside all claim of proof as to miracles, 
accept frankly and freely Hume's axiom, acknowl- 
edge that the gospels are not authentic, and what 
have we left? The Christ of to-day, that no subtle 
intellect of a Renan can displace. 

" Lo, I am with you until the end of time. I was 



Preface. xix 

with you in the beginning, and will be with you to 
the last of earth." It is the Christ of to-day we recog- 
nize, as he has been recognized through the ages. 

The truth that is as clear as sunlight to the see- 
ing is strangely disregarded in this blind chase after 
the vagaries of scientists. Our Savior made no such 
contention. He appeared on earth as a humble Naz- 
arene, the son of a carpenter, and gathered about him 
as his apostles ignorant tent-makers and fishermen. 
He appeared to no school of philosophers, and made 
no attempt to teach that learning which we now 
hold to be so precious. His few years on earth were 
given to appeals to the better part of human nature, 
and to teaching us the divine truth, that in kindness 
that held charity and forgiveness to each other we 
could prepare ourselves for that happiness hereafter 
that can be found in the love of Our Father in 
Heaven. 

His mission, lasting but a brief period, ended in his 
cruel death ; and, search through the recorded gabble 
of the world, and we find stories of brutal conquests — 
the rise of empires and the fall of kings, sages, and 
poets are told of, and their wise teachings and beau- 
tiful words come down to us; but of Christ, of his 
life, sufferings, and crucifixion, there is a dead si- 
lence ; not a word was said, not a sentence went to 
record. The great, noisy world rolled on without 



xx Preface. 

Him. This mission of a carpenter's son was too in- 
significant to command the slightest mention. And 
yet the divine work went on. A ray of God's sun- 
light had pierced the gloom, and strengthened and 
broadened until it embraced all the earth. There 
are no miracles, they tell us; and yet the low, solemn 
teachings of this Nazarene, left to the keeping of 
ignorant laborers, sneered at by scientists, fought 
by conquerors of all-else, the poor followers thrown 
into loathsome prisons to rot, given to wild beasts to 
devour, branded as criminals, and outlawed as con- 
victs hold the earth now and forever. This may not 
be a miracle, but it can be explained only by a true 
reading of our Savior's word, which taught us that 
he appeared to the Christ that was born in us when 
we came fresh from the hands of our Creator; that 
it is the better, stronger, and more vital part of our 
nature, and when awakened gives us a joy no words 
can describe. Such awakening calls for no learning, 
no culture, no burning of the midnight oil in vain 
study of what we can not comprehend. He is with 
us now ; He will be with us until the end of time. 

These thoughts, so long known to the church 
that they have come to be commonplace, are treated 
with lofty contempt by the learned men, who find 
more in a little geological specimen than in all the 
hopes, sorrows, and afflictions of humanity. 



SUNDAY MEDITATIONS 



Searching for the Truth. 

It seems to me, while reading the touching life 
and beautiful teachings of Christ, that the English 
speaking people are nearer to God than those of any 
other tongue. This because of the simplicity and 
power of the pure old English into which these 
chronicles were translated. Other languages may 
have a wider scope and a more perfect construction. 
They may excel in that accuracy so necessary to sci- 
ence, be more musical in sound, more available for 
eloquent utterance, but they never approach our 
mother tongue in those qualities of simplicity that 
make it so easy of comprehension to the unlearned 
and so touchingly beautiful to all. 

And when we bear in mind the object of Christ's 
mission on earth, the blessing grows in worth upon 
us. His mission was to the poor, and his teachings 
intended to give consolation to the humble. Before 
his advent religion was confined to the rich and well- 

(21) 



22 Sunday Meditations. 

born. Philosophers had reasoned out the immortal- 
ity of the soul, and priests had built to them gor- 
geous temples, where the wealthy alone found food 
for thought and a foundation for faith. With the 
mass of suffering humanity religion was a supersti- 
tion and a fear. 

To these last alone came Christ. He asked no 
learning, no subtle reasoning ; he proclaimed his 
truths and attested his authority by miracles — mira- 
cles that leave one in doubt whether they were the 
result of charitable impulse or evidences of his au- 
thority. But all were addressed to the poor and op- 
pressed. Born in a stable, his brief, sad life was 
passed among the toiling millions and the wicked, 
to whom he gave words of comfort, the first that 
ever fell upon their ears. 

He was the first democrat in the history of hu- 
manity. His race was a despised race of laborers, 
hewers of wood and drawers of water. His asso- 
ciates were erring women and wicked men. To these 
he came, these he taught, and to such as these he 
left his divine doctrines of love and forgiveness. 
Born in a manger, he died crucified between two 
thieves. 

Like the prophet of old, he smote the rock for 
the suffering multitude, and from its flinty heart 
leaped into light and life the waters — not for the gold 



Searching for the Truth. 23 

and silver pitchers of the rich and well-born, but to 
flow into lowly places, where down-trodden and op- 
pressed humanity might stoop and drink, and go 
their weary way refreshed. 

To read this simple narrative through tears, one 
must divest himself of the error modern theology 
has thrown over the story. As it is narrated, Christ,- 
the sufferer, is man. He has all the ills that flesh is 
heir to. He has the doubts, fears, anguish, and 
troubles of poor humanity. If he were while on 
earth a God, possessed of powers as such, the narra- 
tive loses all its significance in its loss of sympathy. 
Hector is the hero of Homer's great epic, for Achilles 
was invulnerable. To get at the true meaning of the 
sacrifice, we must go back to the belief of his simple 
followers. They regarded him as the Son of God, 
but a man all the same. Judas Iscariot alone looked 
on him as the Christian world now regards him, as 
one who, through his divine power, could protect 
himself and his followers from all harm. He took 
the thirty pieces of silver, believing a great miracle 
would be wrought in their behalf, to lift his master 
and themselves from the harm of their enemies. 
When he found what a cruel error he had committed, 
he returned the money, and went out in anguish to 
death by his own hands. Peter, in fear, denied his 
master. Christ himself passed the night in prayer, 



24 Sunday Meditations. 

petitioning for what evidently Judas believed would 
happen , and that was that a supernatural power 
would interpose and save him from his enemies. 
Here is the narrative : 

"Then Jesus came with them into a country 
place which is called G-ethsemane ; and he said to his 
.disciples : Sit you here until I go yonder and pray. 
And, taking with him Peter and the two sons of 
Zebedee, he began to grow sorrowful and to be sad. 
Then he said to them : My soul is sorrowful even 
unto death. Stay you here and watch with me. 
And, going a little further, he fell upon his face, 
praying and saying : My Father, if it be possible, 
let this chalice pass from me; nevertheless, not as I 
will, but as thou wilt. And he cometh to his disci- 
ples and findeth them asleep, and he saith to Peter: 
What! could you not watch one hour with me? 
Watch ye and pray, that ye enter not into tempta- 
tion. The spirit is indeed willing, but the flesh is 
weak. Again the second time he went and prayed, 
saying: My Father, if this chalice may not pass 
away, but I must drink it, Thy will be done. And 
he cometh again and findeth them sleeping ; for their 
eyes were heavy ; and, leaving them, he went again, 
and he prayed the third time, saying the self-same 
words." 

He prayed for what ? That he might be saved 



Searching for the Truth. 25 

the cruel tortures and horrible death in store for him 
at the hands of his brutal enemies. 

Any other version of this sad story robs it of all 
meaning. Without the intervention of the man, re- 
ligion is not only without comfort and consolation, 
but is impossible. To share with creation, the wor- 
ship of God is to reduce our earth to an atom and 
the human soul to a nonentity. Astronomy, lifting 
the heavens into the immensity of space that we can 
not comprehend, carried with it the old Hebrew the- 
ology that made God human that we might know 
him, and inhuman that he might be feared. We 
look over the edge of our little horizon, into that 
never-ending space, and shrink back in horror at a 
dreary immensity, to think of which threatens in- 
sanity — is insanity. We can not go to God, and so 
Christ comes to us. He is part of ourselves — shares 
in our wants, weaknesses, hopes, and sorrows. In 
this direction lies our religion : 

" The good we love and cherish most 
Lies close about our feet ; 
It is the dim and distant 
That we are sick to greet." 

As the home is to the world, the religion of 
Christ is to modern theology, that, aided by science, 



26 Sunday Meditations. 

seeks to become a fact and not a faith. It is cold 
and colorless, and without comfort. The church, 

" Like a dome of many colored glass, 
Stains the white radiance of eternity." 

It enters into all the sweet humanities and re- 
lieves the sad troubles of our afflicted life as a parent 
ministers to a child. It is this that gives us comfort 
in Christ, and from this want came the mother of 
Christ, fetching heaven nearer to home and nearer to 
the heart. To become as a little child, to accept 
without questioning the faith offered us, to keep our 
religion where Christ left it, within our own horizon, 
is all we can ask. It is certainly all that we can get. 

The tragic end of Christ's mission on earth has 
been held before mankind through centuries as a 
sacrifice in which death alone is made the measure 
of the atonement. And yet, being man, and as such 
mortal, his enemies only anticipated by a few years 
what would have been his inevitable fate. It was a 
cruel death, it is true ; one in which human ingenuity 
was tasked to extort pain ; but not more so than 
many diseases that to-day afflict humanity. The hu- 
man system is capable of only a certain amount of 
suffering. One would scarcely imagine a more hor- 
rible torture than to be nailed to a cross and left to 
perish from exhaustion. But the violence of the 



Searching for the Truth. 27 

means used would defeat the purpose, for what with 
the loss of blood and intense agony, insensibility 
would soon follow. Nature, true to herself, kindly 
administers relief at the last moment, when powers 
of resistance are exhausted. In the horrible tortures 
invented and practiced in Europe when religious per- 
secution reached its inhuman limit, it was found 
necessary to prolong the suffering by restoring the 
victim through rest and stimulants. Insensibility 
and death baffled the fiends in human shape. 

It was death, and in the death relief, that comes 
sooner or later to all of us. If that were all we 
would find ourselves at a loss to account for the di- 
vine interposition in behalf of poor humanity. It is 
but true that the thought makes one's heart ache, 
that one whose pure life of charitable acts and God- 
like teachings of love and forgiveness made his life 
a miracle, should be howled down by a mob and tor- 
tured to death. But to understand and appreciate 
the blessing bestowed, we must look deeper and 
more wisely to find that there is something more in 
death than the pain of dying. To one who has 
watched the weary days and dreary nights by the 
couch of some loved one, this is painfully evident ; 
for while the heart aches over the suffering it stands 
still at the thought of the separation. Therein lies 
the sting of death, therein exists the victory of the 



28 Sunday Meditations. 

grave that no reasoning makes familiar, no religion 
can afford consolation. It was not, therefore, that 
Christ died, but that on the third day he rose again, 
that brought blessed consolation to the human fam- 
ily. For thousands of years the children of men 
had seen the grave close over the lost and loved, and 
from it come back no whisper, no sign, naught but a 
dead, eternal silence, that found relief only in forget- 
fulness, against which the heart struggled with an 
anguish no words could express. " Why do you 
weep?" asked the philosopher, " tears are unavail- 
ing." " Therefore do I weep," was the truthful and 
touching reply. 

Christ threw the bridge of faith over the dread 
gulf. The grave gave back its answer. Our brief, 
wretched existence reached into the future of eter- 
nity, and what was doom before became only a trial 
calling for patient endurance instead of despair. Be- 
fore then religion was a superstition and a fear with 
the masses. The nearest approach that reason could 
fetch the intellect, of the more cultivated was that 
our dread of annihilation and longing for immortal- 
ity were proofs of a future existence; but how slen- 
der, cold and comfortless the belief, if such it could 
be called, compared with the reality of the narrative, 
told with such simplicity that it leaves no doubt 
upon the mind : 



Searching for the Truth. 29 

"At that time Mary Magdalene and Mary the 
mother of James and Salome brought sweet spices 
that, coming, they might annoint Jesus. And very 
early in the morning the first day of the week they 
came to the sepulcher, the same being now risen, 
and they said one to another, who shall roll us back 
the stone from the door of the sepulcher? And 
looking they saw the stone rolled back ; for it was 
very great. And entering into the sepulcher they 
saw a young man sitting on the right side clothed 
with a white robe — and they were astonished — who 
saith to them : Be not affrightened ; ye seek Jesus 
of Nazareth who was crucified; he is risen, he is not 
here; behold the place where they laid him. But go 
tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you 
into Galilee ; there you shall see him as he told you." 

There are few events more illustrative of the 
new life that dawned on the world than those attend- 
ing the death and resurrection of our Savior. " The 
last at the cross and first at the tomb" were these 
women. Of apostles, Judas had betrayed and Peter 
denied him, while all disappeared, hiding in terror 
from the storm that had so suddenly broken upon 
them. They who look on death when a human being 
is born were the first to learn that death meant life, 
and all that had wrung their hearts in agony on that 
dreadful day, as it had wrung the hearts of millions, 



30 Sunday Meditations. 

was but another and a more beautiful birth, carrying 
us from this earth of sin, sickness and grief to where 
the wicked cease to trouble and the weary are at 
rest. 

Ah ! me, what sweet consolation there is in the 
very music of those words! How life's struggles 
dwindle before them ; how disappointments lose their 
annoyances, and slander, abuse, desertion of friends 
and triumphs of enemies — all that the master mind 
enumerated : 

" The whips and scorns of time, 
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, 
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay, 
The insolence of office and the spurns 
That patient merit of the unworthy take." 

All sink into nothingness before the thought 
that in a few brief years we will have passed beyond 
them, into life where their very memory will cease 
to trouble us. Through the iron gate of death 
streams the light of life hereafter, spreading its 
balm upon even our own earthly unhappiness, giving 
us a taste in anticipation of the blessings reserved 
for us in a higher sphere and more perfect life than 
this. 

Life on earth is what we have known as death, 
and death is life in reality. Even this dull, heavy 
matter of our present being feels a quickening in 



Searching for the Truth. 31 

the change. Science teaches us that this hand that 
traces these lines, that is held in form through life, 
passes after the change into the elements of which it 
is composed so swiftly that in a brief period all save 
the bones disappear. Death then means life, not 
only in the release of the soul, but of the body itself. 
The tendency to clothe a simple fact in religion 
with a mysterious faith in something greater than 
the fact, has nearly robbed us of the true meaning 
of Christ's mission. What can be more sublime, 
beautiful, or more consoling than what he has taught 
us in the resurrection ? 



32 Sunday Meditations 



flatofal and Seated Religion. 

"We know God as we know unending space ; as 
we know eternity ; as we know all things without be- 
ing able to comprehend any thing. It was never de- 
signed that we should. We have just enough intel- 
ligence given us to make a living out of this hard 
earth on which we are destined to exist for a brief 
space. That such intelligence should be given man 
that makes him capable of a better life than the 
brutes beneath him, with qualities that, if developed, 
will lift him to a higher plane and prepare him for a 
better and purer existence, is all upon which we can 
base our religion. By religion I mean that divine 
Power which can satisfy the want born in us that 
craves divine protection, without which earth is a hell, 
and existence a horror. 

This condition is common to all humanity. 
"Wherever found in the more dense, or in the remotest 
and most solitary places — among the barbarous, or 
more civilized — the man is haunted and oppressed, with 
the same sense of dependence, and has the same eager 
longing for help, and utters the same prayer for pro- 
tection. There is no man walking erect, and possessed 



Natural arid Revealed Religion. 33 

of any mind, but feels this want. There is no intellect, 
however cultivated, but recognizes its existence. 

This is the condition to-day, and such it has been 
throughout the ages. All the world's sand-buried 
records found in Egypt that tell of a high civilization 
in the dim, forgotten past, has but one clear story, 
and that is of religion. The tale of empire, the 
records of great conquests, the history of dynasties, of 
king-haunted wars, are all blurred and dim, almost 
beyond comprehension, but deeply engraved on im- 
perishable stone sculptured and yet bright in paint 
runs on and on the story of religion. The huge 
temples were palaces, and the palaces were temples, 
and the god they worshiped was a god of war and 
vengeance. Swarming about these sand-covered 
ruins of these gigantic memories of a mighty past 
are the naked Arabs, and they have one thing in 
common with these once illustrious dead, and that is 
the same natural religion. To the ignorant it is one 
of fear; to the more cultured, one of despair. The 
savage hears the awful voice of God in the thunder, 
sees his vengeance in the violence of the tempest, and 
tremblingly prays to be protected from the very god 
to whom he petitions in his prayers. They who are 
lifted by our little learning above this groveling con- 
dition may pronounce such belief superstition with- 
out freeing themselves from the very fear that brought 



34 Sunday Meditations. 

such superstition into existence. The god of science, 
the great first cause is the most terrible of all. Be- 
yond human conception, lost in the realms of space 
at the mere thought of Him, the heart is stilled in 
terror as the finite mind reels back upon itself in 
dazed insanity. 

This is natural religion, a great realty, a fact that 
gives our faith its firm foundation. It was the field 
prepared for the seed our Savior found, and gives us 
reason for the quick growth that clad the earth with 
such abundance in His presence, then, as now, and 
through all time. When asked, then, to prove that 
once upon a time far back in the centuries, our God, 
in the form of man, lived and suffered, we say that it 
is the Christ of to-day who concerns us. His divine 
teachings through His church have never ceased, and 
that which won humanity in the beginning wins us 
now. How strong this was and is, the awful persecu- 
tions, that sought to stamp out the truth of God tell 
us, and we are not to be moved by the sneers and 
scoffing of modern unbelief. 

Of all the stored information among men, the 
least available in seeking to gratify the religious want 
implanted is the logic legalized in what is called the 
law of evidence. This which comes of human expe- 
rience, and is so useful in our tribunals when we seek 
to punish the guilty and protect the innocent, fails to 



Natural and Revealed Religion. 35 

be of any service Avhen applied to religion. It is 
based on the offspring of evidence we call belief, that 
is involuntary, and has in it, therefore, no merit. 
And this evidence runs exclusively on human experi- 
ence. How utterly futile and impotent is this little 
machinery when applied to God's works, when our 
brief experience is lost in eternity, and measures less 
than a mote in boundless space ! 

" We can not believe a miracle,'' says this rule of 
evidence, " until it would be a miracle to disbelieve 
it." We present a miracle in evidence of our belief 
and are calmly told to prove our miracle. Of course 
this is correct in our earthly court, but what be- 
comes of the wise axiom in a creation where to us 
all things are miracles ? Lifting my right arm in re- 
sponse to a thought is as great a miracle to me as 
lifting one from the dead. The motion of my arm 
has come to be a common occurrence, and therefore 
probable; the return of the dead happened but twice 
in the centuries, therefore is it so wonderful that it 
becomes improbable and can not be believed. 

Nevertheless the mystery remains. No frequent 
repetition of the event solves its deep obscurity. The 
horizon of human knowledge lies close about us. It 
is almost within reach ; beyond is blank darkness. 
And the mystery is in all things, as much in the blade 
of grass at our feet as in the endless star-lit realms 
of space. 



36 Sunday Meditations. 

And we recognize as divine, the teachings of 
Christ, as they reach us through His Church, because 
they come to us with all the warmth and light of the 
sun. They respond to the want within us for divine 
guidance and sympathy that is more potent than in 
the body is the appetite for food, or the demand for 
breath, or loving impulse, and it can not be set aside, 
silenced or satisfied by the intellectual processes any 
more than hunger can be gratified by dreams of food, 
or the lungs be filled and life made stronger by arti- 
ficial inflation of the lungs. Ask for proof in accord 
with the human law of evidence that Christ lives,*as 
well ask a child to prove the existence of its mother. 
The awakened soul hears the voice of its Savior, and 
a strange peace follows the call. The belief is not 
that of our courts, but a longing faith that prays to be 
made firmer by divine interposition, as the drowning 
sailor clinging to a spar calls on God for strength. 
True, one is fed, but not satisfied. We believe while 
longing to believe, and why not? The teachings are 
sweet, wholesome and life-giving. To live by such 
precepts and self-denial is to reach a higher plane, and 
breathe a purer air and be as near content as our life 
on earth allows. Why should I put all this aside at 
the arrogant bidding of a man whose pretense to su- 
perior learning is a miserable mockery ? 

Let one, returning from the grave of buried love, 



Natural and Revealed Religion. 37 

when the very heart seems torn out and left with the 
dead, be asked to abandon the consolation found in 
the faith that tells us this is not the end, there is a 
life beyond, and the mourner will realize the bless- 
ings of Christian belief. It is thus we are made bet- 
ter and we are made blessed. From the dreary 
thoughts of an awful universe ; from the cares and 
ills of life; from the pains and agonizing grief caused 
by disease and death, Ave turn to the Church of our 
Savior to find refuge, peace and that calm content 
that surpasses in value all the gifts of the world. In 
its divine results we find its divine origin. No man 
can read the touching story of our Savior's life on 
earth, no one can . hear His teachings without re- 
sponding eagerly to both. 

A vine planted in a dim cellar grows blindly, 
groping its way to the ray that penetrates a crevice, 
and, finding the outlet, struggles into light and life. 
And so the poor soul, all ignorant or lost in the learn- 
ing of the world, turns longing to the light, that it 
may live. There is no comfort in the cold teachings 
of science, no consolation in a godless world. Home- 
less, helpless, hopeless and half insane, the soul seeks 
the ray dropped through the crevice for light and 
life, found as the blessings of our beautiful religion. 



38 Sunday Meditations. 



Gheeffalness a Duty. 

We. begin life with the discovery that all good 
things are dull, and we are apt to end considering all 
dull things good. 

What there is in Christianity as taught by Christ to 
make one sad or even serious, is more than a reason- 
ing being can answer. We are mo^ed to sorrow by 
the struggles and suffering of one whose brief life 
was full of trouble, but his teachings are those that 
should make the heart glad. He brought good- will 
to men on earth, taught them forgiveness, love, and 
sympathy, and, that greatest boon of all, he lifted the 
dark veil of death and showed us that beyond our 
close, narrow horizon, was life, immortal life. 

Aside from this, however, there is no merit that 
we can discover in being melancholy. On the con- 
trary, a grave man is simply endured, while a sorrow- 
ful man is pitied, a morose character is detested. No 
one thinks it necessary to look upon such a condition 
as meritorious. Why then should we believe that 
we are commending ourselves to our Maker by an 
exhibit of solemnity? And yet intense solemnity is 
about the only religion in a majority of mankind. 
A few, at long intervals, compromise upon a smirk 



Cheerfulness a Duty. 39 

that is only skin deep in feeling, and has in it more 
conceit than a sense of humor, the last being guarded 
against as a deadly sin. They treat their God as if 
he were on the watch to catch one of his saints in a 
broad grin, indicative of that broad way down to 
eternal punishment, when the grin is impossible. 

And yet nature has made this sense of humor a 
distinctive mark of humanity. Man is the only ani- 
mal that laughs. What can be more beautiful, and 
beautiful in its innocence, than the merry laugh of 
children, unto whom Christ compared the kingdom 
of heaven ? Or the hearty bursts of early youth, full 
of hope and health ? The man or woman who can 
not laugh is to be feared. Such a creation is but 
half made up — a monster seeking to possess what he 
or she can not enjoy. The sense of humor is to hu- 
manity what light is to earth, and light is not the 
sense of seeing — it is life. We only share in every 
emotion the beneficial results of some law that ex- 
tends to all creatures. The man, then, who would 
divest himself of the healthful influences of humor, 
would be as wise as he who would destroy his sight 
lest the enjoyment of light might prove sinful. His 
sight would be gone, but the light remains. 

This dark and dreary view of religion is a rem- 
nant of the superstitious fear that haunted poor hu- 
manity before the coming of Christ. The God of 



40 Sunday Meditations. 

the Jews, as told in those naked chronicles of a cruel 
race, is a God of vengeance. His patriarchs and 
prophets were famous, and should be infamous for 
crimes their God sanctioned. He was the God of 
war, pestilence, and famine. The little life of his 
followers was bounded by misery, with no beautiful 
hereafter to alleviate their suffering-. They were 
not taught to love their God, but commanded to love 
God and fear him — the last only being possible. Are 
we commanded to love Christ — is the child com- 
manded to love its mother — or the mother the help- 
less little creature that is born of her body, but 
never from her heart ? Does one need any command 
to love the dear, helpless invalid dependent upon 
one's care? To claim such feeling as a merit is in 
itself the tangled end of a confusing superstition. 

The heathen mythology, as it is called, wherein 
poets and priests created deities out of their passions, 
was of the same sort. The speculations of its phi- 
losophers were like rockets shot up into the night, 
that to the ignorant seemed to reach the stars. They 
exploded only to leave the night darker than before. 
But what was poetry to the cultured was superstition 
to the masses, and only one remove in its touches of 
humanity from the dark and dreary belief of the 
Jews. 

How gladly we turn from all this murky night 



Cheerfulness a Duty. 41 

of ignorance and terror to the beautiful dawn of life 
that came in with Christ. While His life was brief 
and full of sorrow, there is nothing in His teachings 
or example to encourage the puritanical sourness so 
generally mistaken for religion. Because life here- 
after is made to appear beautiful, it does not detract 
from the healthy sweetness of this life. There is no 
reason for the belief that Christ was of a sorrowful 
temperament. They who tell the story of his life are 
so filled with memories of his miracles, teachings, 
tragic death, and resurrection, that they give no space 
to aught disconnected from what they considered of 
such vital importance. But a close study of their 
testament leaves no impression upon the unprejudiced 
mind that he was a stern man. The popular mind 
in this respect gets its impression from the sad, weak 
face painted by the old Italian masters. 

Nor is it likely that He differed from humanity 
in His manner or ways beyond what His mission de- 
manded. That His first miracle was wrought at a 
wedding festivity, and was done in aid of the enjoy- 
ment the poor people sought to further beyond their 
means, is in proof of what we assert. Let any one 
read the story as told, and divesting one's mind of 
the glamor of divinity that for our sake Christ re- 
nounced, being man among men, and see how 

4 



42 Sunday Meditations. 

sweetly the character comes out from the dim records 
left in this respect so obscure. Here is the story : 

"And the third day there was a marriage in 
Cana of Galilee. And both Jesus and His disciples 
were called to the marriage. And when they wanted 
wine the mother of Jesus saith unto him : They 
have no wine. Jesus saith unto her : Woman, what 
have I to do with thee ? Mine hour is not yet come. 
The mother saith unto the servants : Whatsoever He 
saith unto you do it. And there were set there six 
water pots of stone, after the manner of purifying 
of the Jews, containing two or three firkins apiece. 
Jesus saith unto them : Fill the water pots with 
water. And they filled them to the brim. And He 
saith unto them : Draw out now and bear unto the 
governor of the feast. And they bore it. When 
the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was 
made wine and knew not whence it was (but the 
servants which drew the water knew), the governor 
of the feast called the bridegroom and saith unto 
him : Every man at the beginning doth set forth 
good wine, and when men have drank, then that 
which is worse ; but thou hast kept the good wine 
until now. This beginning of miracles did Jesus in 
Cana of Galilee and manifested forth of His glory, 
and His disciples believed in Him." 

That this miracle of the wine was wrought from 



Cheerfulness a Duty. 43 

no desire to proclaim His divine power is evident. 
At the marriage feast to which He and His humble 
followers were invited the poor women, mortified at 
the lack of refreshments, moved His pity ; and what 
meant His divine interference in this light is shown 
by his reply to His mother, " Mine hour is not yet 
come;" that was the hour in which His divine au- 
thority was to be tested by His miracles. And from 
the conversation and the confidence in which she re- 
gards His effort, it is evident that He had imparted 
to His mother the fact of His divine mission before 
He gave it to the world. 

To have been a welcome guest at this feast He 
could not have been the austere, unhappy man, such 
as His many misguided followers and imitators are 
to-day. What that feast was the ruler of it tells us 
when he refers to the practice of giving the good 
wine first, that, under its stimulating influence, the 
bad may pass unnoticed. It must have been a merry 
occasion ; and as to that enjoyment Christ has so 
materially contributed, it is not likely He dampened 
the festivities by a cold, forbidding manner. 

The tendency to distort through the uncultured 
imagination of the multitude has well nigh deprived 
us of a knowledge of Christ. One, in reading the 
gospel, has to clear away centuries of exaggeration 
and error. The love that is part of adoration is soon 



44 Sunday Meditations. 

lost in awe and fear. We are not willing to accept 
Christ as He came to us. We work His manger into 
a cradle of gold, and we banish from our minds as 
blasphemy the fact that He was reared a mechanic. 
It is shocking to think that He was a guest at a wed- 
ding festivity and enjoyed the feast as other young 
men. "Ah ! " says the Rev. Chadband with a snuffle, 
" He sought to give the sanction of His divine pres- 
ence to the holy sacrament of matrimony." Let the 
Rev. Chadband study the Hebrew law regulating 
marriages of that day, and he will see what a holy 
sacrament our Savior is said to have sanctioned. 

No, He went to the feast as He walked the earth, 
clad in His humanity, and doubtless found in its in- 
nocent enjoyment a pleasant rest from the mystery 
of His mission and the dark forebodings of His own 
fate. He grew in grace and stature, and He sought 
to win His brother men to His side by reason and per- 
suasion, and men marveled at His words of wisdom, 
that were as sweet as they were truthful, and He who 
brought such great joy to men could not Himself 
have been cold, austere and forbidding. 



The Courage that Suffers. 45 



The Cowage that Suffers. 

With all the humanity, the charity, the loving 
forgiveness, and good will for man shown in the mis- 
sion of Christ, one is struck with the store placed on 
courage. Non-resistance based on courage makes of 
that high quality its truest and purest test. To pa- 
tiently submit to wrong, insult, and pain, is to be 
brave without the aid that comes from resistance, 
however hopeless. No one knows this better than the 
officer who has seen actual service. There is no duty 
more trying than to hold a reserve under fire. Men 
who will go into a charge with a dash, or receive one 
with coolness when fighting, falter before the danger 
that can not be resisted. 

Not the least trying part of the ordeal is the 
sense of degradation that accompanies non-resistance. 
No one questions in the abstract that to submit calls 
for a higher courage than resistance ; but the sufferer 
asks of himself: Who and what am I that I should 
be trampled upon? It is hard to realize that Christ 
appealed to the divinity of our nature from that 
brutal part which is based on might, and not on true 
courage. To get at the true meaning of this, one 
must occupy a more elevated plane than that of poor 



46 Sunday Meditations. 

material humanity. Once enabled to look down upon 
earth, how monstrous and grotesque are our quarrels! 
Our brief existence is one long struggle with pain, 
trouble, sorrow, and full of the crudest disappoint- 
ments. Why should we seek to add to these afflic- 
tions by quarrels, persecutions, and abuse of each 
other? Frail specters of a brief existence, why 
wantonly shorten that existence ? Passions of a 
wrathful, aggressive sort are therefore insane and 
brutal. To look at them from this Christian light, 
and act upon such knowledge, demand the highest in- 
telligence and the purest courage. To these Christ 
appealed in his teaching of non-resistance. 

We must not delude ourselves from these facts, 
that a Christian life is here or hereafter one of peace. 
We are promised a re- existence hereafter. How that 
life is maintained, at what cost it was gained, and 
how held, are questions that come to us; for evil did 
not begin with this life, nor does it end here. 

Through all the teachings of Christ, through all 
the blind experience of humanity, we are taught that 
evil is immortal. A vast shadow resting upon the 
edge of this life swings out, dark and foreboding, 
through all space and all eternity. It is evil, and it 
wars forever with good, as good with evil, and it 
seems to us as if the one immutable law of our na- 
ture is war. The dread chills the heart that the evil 



The Courage that Suffers. 47 

nearly equals the good in power. Of a surety so far 
as this life goes, the evil is in the ascendant. Will it 
continue beyond the grave ? 

One might comfort himself with the thought 
that our brief experience on earth, between the cradle 
and the grave, is so unsatisfactory that we can not 
tell, can form no idea of what our mortal existence 
is to be hereafter. It is as if one born in the begin- 
ning of winter were to mature and die as the winter 
ends, without knowledge of the spring, summer, and 
autumn that follow. But revelations give us no such 
comfort. In them evil is immortal and war eternal. 
That to the virtuous a heaven is promised, that the 
children of men who have accepted the faith and 
fought the good fight shall find a home with Christ, 
where the wicked cease to trouble and the weary are 
at rest, is true, but it is the safety afforded helpless 
women and children of a great army, where the com- 
batants only are exposed. 

What is this horrible, ghastly shadow that haunts 
our life, and is never from our thought ? That it is 
not of this world alone we all know, as earth carries 
daylight in the heart of night, and that but a little 
way beyond our little circle sun, moon, stars, all dis- 
appear in an eternal blackness, later science teaches 
us ; and how much of God's moral light, that like 
the physical seems to prevade all space, is really lim- 



48 Sunday Meditations. 

ited, who can say ? Without being spoken in words, 
the fear haunts the holy writing from end to end. 
When Christ says to Peter, " Upon this rock I build 
my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail 
against it," He speaks exultingly, as if the fortress 
had at last been found against which the powers of 
evil could not prevail. What are these gates of hell 
that seem to defy the son of God ? 

Whatever they may be, courage is the one great 
quality most dwelt upon, as most necessary to the 
Christian. And how calm and brave" through all his 
perils was our Savior ! He alone felt and realized the 
trial in store for him. His simple, ignorant followers, 
regarding him as possessed of supernatural powers, 
saw nothing in their future to create alarm. He fore- 
saw, and looking beyond this life into that eternal 
hereafter, we can not tell what he saw to so cast him 
down that he prayed to be spared the sacrifice. 
This depression came upon him, according to St. 
Matthew : 

" At that time Jesus said to his disciples : You 
know that after two days shall be the pasch, and the 
son of man shall be delivered up to be crucified. 
Then were gathered together the chief priests and 
ancients of the people into the court of the high 
priest, who was called Caiaphas ; and they consulted 
together, that by subtlety they might apprehend 



The Courage that Suffers. 49 

Jesus and put Him to death. But they said : Not on 
the festival day, lest perhaps there should be a tu- 
mult among the people. And when Jesus was in 
Bethania, in the house of Simon the leper, there came 
to him a woman bearing an alabaster box of precious 
ointment, and poured it on His head as He was at the 
table. And the disciples, seeing it, had indignation, 
saying : To what purpose is this waste ; for this might 
have been sold for much and given to the poor? And 
Jesus knowing it, said to them : Why do you trouble 
this woman, for she hath wrought a good work upon 
me? For the poor you have always with you ; but 
me you have not always. For she, in pouring this 
ointment upon my body hath done it for my burial." 

Of all the tragic utterances ever recorded there 
is not one like this: "For she, in pouring this oint- 
ment upon my body, hath done it for my burial." 

At that feast of unsuspecting friends and fol- 
lowers, the ghastly phantom of death sits unseen by 
all save the son of God, whose body is being already 
anointed for the burial. A little while longer and 
these simple believers, these fisherman and tent- 
makers who have left their humble callings to follow 
Christ, will have the poor with them, but not their 
God and prophet. They will look no more upon that 
face whose quiet courage gave them confidence, as 
his sweet voice gave them comfort. Scattered, per- 
5 



50 Sunday Meditations. 

secuted, driven like beasts from the haunts of man, 
putting the mark of death upon all they baptized in 
the new faith, they will each find his sad end wide 
apart from the others, and looking from earth to the 
sky into which he disappeared, and see the sun rise 
and set, and the stars take in eternal silence their 
glittering way, but no Savior. There will be left to 
them, as to the children of men for all ages to come, 
only the memory of His sweet words, the high future 
of His heavenly promise. He taught them the wis- 
dom of God, He bequeathed them the courage of 
martyrs. They were to learn that as the children of 
earth come into life through the throes of death, and 
die from insiduous disease or slow decay, so all good 
is born of violence, and is lost through fraud. So 
long as religion meant life hereafter, that antago- 
nized the comforts and luxuries here, it was met with 
a deadly resistance. Since it has accommodated it- 
self to the enjoyment of the good things of earth, 
peace reigns among men. 

We never weary of reading and meditating upon 
the briefly but beautifully told story of that feast 
where the woman annointecl the head of our Savior. 
His mission was drawing to a close. Already His 
deadly enemies, the high priests and the ancieuts of 
the people, were gathering about Him to compass 
His death. He sat at the feast loved and worshiped, 



The Courage that Suffers. 51 

and all about Him seemed peace and pleasantness. 
But after the precious ointment was poured upon 
His sacred head, under our zealous remonstrance, He 
revealed the dark forebodings He had concealed. 
He says sadly and with such true force in its sim- 
plicity : " For she, in pouring this ointment upon my 
body, hath clone it for my burial." 

The days of brutal abuse, the horrible persecution 
and the horrible death, all were gone, and the poor 
lifeless remains alone were being anointed. To the 
son of God came the same strange warning that 
often visits the children of men. As the great Ger- 
man poet has said : 

" There is no doubt that there exists such voices, 
Yet I would not call them 
Voices of warning, that announce to us 
Only the inevitable. As the sun, 
Ere it is risen, sometimes paints its image 
In the atmosphere ; so often do the spirits 
Of great events stride on before the events, 
And in to-day already walks to-morrow." 



And what a morrow broke on humanity ! After 
ages of chaos anc 
came to us of earth ! 



the ages of chaos and night, what a calm, sweet dawn 



52 Sunday Meditations. 



The Giving o! films. ' 

" Take heed that you do not your alms before 
men to be seen of them ; otherwise you have no re- 
ward of your Father who is in heaven. 

" Therefore when thou doest thine alms do not 
sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in 
the synagogues and in the streets that they may have 
glory of men. Verily I say unto you 'they have their 
reward. 

" But when thou doest alms let not the left 
hand know what thy right hand doeth : 

" That thy alms may be in secret and thy Father, 
who seeth in secret Himself, shall reward thee openly. 

" And when thou prayest thou shalt not be as 
the hypocrites are, for they love to pray standing in 
the synagogues and on the corners of the streets that 
they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you 
they have their reward. 

"But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy 
closet and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy 
Father which is in secret ; and thy Father, who seeth 
in secret, shall reward thee openly." 

What a sweet, subtle knowledge of our nature 
and its needs is found in the above passages, where 



The Giving of Alms. 53 

charity and prayer are classed together and so beau- 
tifully defined. That which is done for a reward 
must be satisfied with the reward. The man who, 
through an exhibit of his piety, strives to win the 
admiration of his fellow men, must be content with 
that compensation. The true Christian, who seeks 
the approbation of Christ through a purification of 
himself, will find his reward in the harmonizing and 
improved health of his own nature. 

Both charity and prayer are for the benefit of 
the one who gives and petitions. Prayer is but an- 
other name for confession, that follows a recognition 
of our own sins from which we seek to cleanse our- 
selves ; while charity has little good beyond the de- 
velopment of all that is kind and generous in our 
own nature. 

The centuries have but little changed our na- 
ture. The Jews had, as we have, the men who sound 
trumpets over their giving, and standing in public 
places, pour out their prayers for the ears of men and 
not the heart of Christ. Doubtlessly the Hebrews 
were besotted then, as we are now, with the thought 
that charity was meant almost exclusively to benefit 
the recipients and not the giver. They, too, proba- 
bly, had their organized charities, orphan asylums, 
homes for aged poor, and hospitals for the penniless 
sick. And these fat, substantial citizens, who by 



54 Sunday Meditations. 

close dealings and hard bargains had accumulated 
wealth, gave pennies from hoarded thousands to or- 
ganized charities, and thought thereby to have pur- 
chased a peace with their Creator. 

How our Savior must have amazed that people, 
of all mankind the most avaricious and hard, by 
tbese strange doctrines! What a struggle he had to 
obtain a hearing and secure any consideration. But 
that he spoke to the poor, and that his wise, kind 
words went to their hearts, where they were treas- 
ured, his revelations would have been lost to hu- 
manity. 

It is well for us that his advent was in advance 
of an enlightened press. How the leading journals 
of Jerusalem would have sneered at, ridiculed and 
reviled the poor carpenter and his ignorant follow- 
ers ! The subsidized organs of a commercial people 
would have seen in him only a dangerous communist 
or an insane fanatic, making an attack on the very 
foundations of social organization. The Moses and 
Sons, Aaron and Brother, Rothschilds, and other lead- 
ing citizens, did not differ in any respect from the 
same class of to-day. We, too, have our Christian 
statesman, whose charity is accompanied with trum- 
pets, and who gives God good advice in a loud voice 
in public places. 

Then, as now, the charity was reserved to the 



The Giving of Alms. 55 

deserving poor. The old delusion exists to-day that 
the sole purpose of charity is to help the poor, as 
that prayer is a cunningly devised process through 
which to conciliate God. We can not help the 
needy. Were all the accumulated property of the 
world thrown into a common heap and divided 
equally, it would not be many days before the strong 
and cunning would leave the improvident and weak 
to suffer. " The poor ye have always," said Christ ; 
and so long as we have wicked, selfish men, weak 
men must suffer. And how utterly hopeless we make 
the task of relief when we restrict our efforts to the 
deserving poor, and how little of Christ is there in 
the restriction. When Christ bade us administer to 
the sick, He did not say the deserving sick ; nor when 
we are bid to feed the hungry and clothe the naked, 
does He qualify by saying the deserving hungry and 
the deserving naked. 

We know that the wicked stomach and the 
sinful back suffered as keenly as the righteous stom- 
ach and back, and both sorts were His children. De- 
serving people indeed ! His beautiful life was passed 
amid the poor and sinful. He was the associate and 
friend of vicious men and fallen women, and died at 
last between two thieves who were not deserving in 
the eyes of men, yet He carried the poor wretches 
with Him into heaven. The "Treat heart went out to 



56 Sunday Meditations. 

all the children of men, and it teaches us that true 
charity is a charity to ourselves, an elevating, healthy 
impulse, and not a calculation. 

Does one ever reflect how little we can do for 
the poor? The difference between wealth and pov- 
erty are most imaginary. The beggar in his rags 
has about as much happiness as the millionaire in his 
fine linen. Happiness is not in the linen nor the 
lack of it in the rags. Pain and privation are posi- 
tive evils, but pain comes to the rich as well as the 
poor, while hunger and nakedness do not call for 
much, and are of small account, if their relief were 
all when placed to our account with God. 

Let us build an orphan asylum of the stoutest 
walls, and beautify it with all that art can give, and 
we can not replace a mother's love, that makes in its 
loss the orphan. It is the giving that makes the 
good ; and the poor sister of charity, half mother and 
half angel, who gives all she has to the poor and 
sick, little dreams in her self-sacrificing privation 
that she is getting a reward here that she prays for 
in the hereafter. Ah ! God lift us from the hell of 
self-torture — this sense of sin, this loss of self-respect — 
and give us content with ourselves, and the heaven 
of the hereafter is the heaven of to-day. 

The lesson of charity taught by Christ has been 



The Giving of Alms. 57 

taken up from time to time through the ages, and 
repeated mostly by women to the human family. 
Well we remember when a child walking unawares 
with Christ and being taught that lesson by one 
whose memory is watered with tears, although she 
died many years since, after eighty-four years of 
goodness on earth. It has been indeed since the 
death that a clearer sight of her sacred life has been 
given, for the moistened clay that restored sight to 
the blind man, told of by the chroniclers of Christ, 
is the clay of the grave moistened with tears, when 
we see too late all that we have lost. 

It was one of the coldest days of midwinter, 
when on her way along the freezing street, this 
mother encountered a thinly clad, shivering woman, 
evidently very poor, and evidently, alas, very de- 
graded. Her thin, ragged gown was in tatters, and 
her face bore all the brutal marks of intoxicating 
drink. But she was suffering ; how she did shiver 
in the bitter, freezing wind, and as we stopped she 
gave such a wistful, hungry look out of her inflamed 
eyes, as a suffering beast would. The woman ap- 
pealed to looked anxiously up and down the street ; 
no one was near, and, hurriedly taking the warm 
shawl from her shoulders, she wrapped it about those 
of the sufferer, and then hurried on. 



58 Sunday Meditations. 

Of course, she knew that the shawl would be 
pawned for liquor, but the impulse had its reward in 
the charity given to her own heart hungering for 
good works, and in the lesson that survives to-day as 
vividly as when it was given. 



The Poor in Spirit. 59 



The Poop in Spirit. 

"And seeing the multitude He went up into a 
mountain, and when He was set His disciples came 
unto Him, and He opened his mouth and taught them, 
saying : 

" ' Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the 
kingdom of heaven.' " 

These, according to St. Matthew, are the first 
recorded words of Christ, and how pregnant of 
meaning and how beautiful of utterance they are. 

The multitude, followed him to the mountain. 
It was a multitude made up of the poor and op- 
pressed. Probably in all that multitude there was 
not one even well to do in the world's goods. The 
rich and well-born of that day, as of this, did not 
seek Christ, nor were they sought for by Him. He 
had said in the synagogue on the Sabbath day: 

" The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He 
hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor ; 
He hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to 
preach deliverance to the captives and the recovery 
of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those that are 
bruised." 



60 Sunday Meditations. 

Blessed words, that after all the centuries come 
to us now as fresh as when uttered. 

"As dew is to the drooping flower, 

As sunlight to the sea, 
To my sad heart, oh ! gracious Lord, 
Are thy dear words to me." 

He was known to the poor, and they had followed 
Him to the mountains. The strange magnetism of 
His beautiful presence, the sweet, wise utterances, had 
gone to their hearts, and as trustingly as sheep are 
led by the shepherd these poor creatures went to their 
Savior and gathering about Him, listened, amazed, to 
the first kind words given them through all the ages. 
Their redemption was at hand. The curse of God, 
put upon Adam and all his race, that by the sweat 
of the brow should their bread be earned, was turned 
to a blessing. 

Let us realize the condition of humanity at that 
time. Take from us all that christianized civilization 
has done for toiling millions ; wipe out the intelli- 
gence that has spread to the many ; make life a struggle 
for a bare subsistence, scarcely one remove from the 
condition of a brute — nay, worse, for the brute has its 
master interested in its health and strength— and pur 
wonder is that His words reached such deadened hearts, 
and so wakened them to life that they were not only 



The Poor in Spirit. 61 

received but treasured. They were so treasured that 
for over three hundred years these hearts were the 
only tablets upon which they were written. All that 
the divine Master taught on earth were passed from 
parent to child, with not a word lost nor a truth 
misstated. What greater miracle than this ! 

Nor does the miracle end here. Sunlit science 
has sent the heavens off into the unfathomable im- 
mensity of space. It has taken from us the sun, 
moon, and stars. It has made a mote of our earth 
and atoms of humanity. It has taught us to know 
that we know nothing, and that all the boasted 
powers of the intellect touch only one little point 
of a great circle, whirling beyond our poor compre- 
hension into never-ending space and through all 
eternity. But it has not taken from us our Christ, 
and to the learned as well as the unlearned there is 
comfort and refuge in His love, in His protection, in 
His wisdom. 

" Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the 
kingdom of heaven." 

These poor toilers without hope, who saw only 
between the cradle and the grave hard, unrequited 
labor, degradation, and abuse, and beyond the grave 
nothing — brutes in human form, brutes with unde- 
veloped manhood in them, possessed only of a strange 
longing for some better life and higher living — they 



62 Sunday Meditations. 

were spoken to, not by earthly prince or potentate, 
by no prophet, poet, or philosopher, but by a God 
whose words awoke life in the dead— the dead 
through thousands and thousands of years — and so 
He gave sight to the blind, healing to the sick, and 
deliverance to the imprisoned. He gave them their 
manhood; He breathed hope into their deadened 
hearts; He taught them that that which had been 
their curse should hereafter be their blessing. The 
sweat of the brow was no longer to be the badge of 
slavery, but the rain of heaven, that would develop 
all our being into health. 

Since then servitude is the better process to a 
higher manhood. The masters pine, and wither, and 
disappear, the slaves grow strong, and in time be- 
come the masters. The brave races now on earth, 
who have conquered rough nature and made the 
earth a pleasant abiding place, came up from servi- 
tude. 

It is but a few centuries since our ancestors wore 
iron collars about their necks and labored under the 
whips of their masters. 

Christ was loved and worshiped by the poor and 
crucified by the rich. He is to-day forgotten by the 
one and loved by the other. So long as human 
nature remains as it is, as it was, and as it promises 
ever to be, money-getting will be its curse, its great 



The Poor in Spirit. 63 

sin. It deadens the moral nature, destroys the taste, 
and so hardens the nature that the divine command 
of " love one another" is impossible. This was the 
one sin Christ could not forgive, the one sinner 
whose repentance He made almost impossible. To 
the frightened cry of the rich man, " What shall I 
do to be saved?" He responded sternly, "Give all 
thou hast to the poor and follow me." Fear, not 
love, dictated the question; justice rendered the an- 
swer. 

Christ demanded no impossibility. The leopard 
could as well change his spots as the rich man his 
nature. Our Savior commiserated other sorts of sin- 
ners. He consorted with the wicked, looked affec- 
tionately upon Mary Magdalene, forgave the woman 
caught in adultery, so kindly that His heart seemed 
to go with the pardon ; He even carried the crucified 
thieves into heaven with Him ; but for the man who 
bartered his soul for earthly gain he had no mercy, 
no compromise; he must cease, as it were, to be, be- 
fore he could begin to serve. 

A study of human nature confirms the justice 
of his decree. There is nothing that so deadens the 
soul and destroys the humanity as the abject pursuit 
of gold — the greed that accumulates for the sake of 
the accumulation. The yellow demon of the mine 



64 Sunday Meditations. 

is the enemy of mankind, the one cruel, hungry, 
despotic devil that feeds on its worshiper and blights 
all that he touches. 

Christ drove the money-changers from the tem- 
ple, but He could not drive the love of money from 
our hearts. He left His curse — He who cursed so lit- 
tle and blessed so much — upon the money-getters. 
He lifted the beggar from the gate to the heaven of 
the good, while He assigned the rich man to eternal 
torment. And yet to-day, as of old, His temple is 
thronged with the money-changers, who drop their 
coin into the boxes of the poor as toll wherewith to 
pay their way along a beaten road to heaven. And 
who among us, after all the centuries through which 
the admonition comes, seasons his prayer with the 
comforting reflection that during the day he, in imi- 
tation of our Savior, parted with some of his posses- 
sions in charity ? 

The poor are Christ's true friends; the rich, 
never. The rich man's religion is fear and faith, and 
his salvation is paid for. " Two men do I honor," 
said a philosopher, "and no third. One is the hard- 
handed, honest laborer, and the other the man who, 
devoting himself to God, serves as Christ's repre- 
sentative on earth in teaching ' peace and good will 
to man on earth and glory to God on high.' " And 



The Poor in Spirit. 65 

when such shall have passed from the earth they 
blessed to the heaven they are to enjoy, Christ will 
meet and give them welcome. They are of those he 
came to comfort, and in the many chambers of his 
father's house they will find their home. 



66 Sunday Meditations. 



Pity for the fallen. 

Jesus went into the mount of Olives. 

"And early in the morning He came again into 
the temple, and all the people came unto Him; and 
He sat down, and taught them. 

"And the Scribes and Pharisees brought unto 
Him a woman taken in adultery; and when they had 
set her in the midst, 

" They say unto Him, Master, this woman was 
taken in adultery, in the very act. 

"Now Moses in the law commanded us that 
such should be stoned ; but what sayest thou ? 

" This they said, tempting Him, that they might 
have to accuse Him. But Jesus stooped down, and 
with His finger wrote on the ground, as though He 
heard them not. 

" So, when they continued asking Him, He lifted 
up Himself, and said unto them, He that is without 
sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. 

" And again He stooped down, and wrote on 
the ground. 

"And they which heard it, being convicted by 
their own conscience, went out one by one, beginning 



Pity for the Fallen. 67 

at the eldest, even unto the last ; and Jesus was left 
alone, and the woman standing in the midst. 

" When Jesus had lifted up Himself, and saw 
none but the woman, He said unto her, Woman, 
where are those thine accusers ? Hath no man con- 
demned thee? 

" She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto 
her, Neither do I condemn thee : go and sin no 
more." 

Of all offenses, through all ages and all climes, 
the one that meets with the swiftest and crudest 
punishment was that selected by the Scribes and 
Pharisees to tempt our Savior. This is one connect- 
ing link between humanity and the brute. Nay, it 
is all brutal. It is not where the man ends and the 
beast begins, for with that wrath once aroused the 
creature made in God's likeness is all brute. It is 
fierce as hell and cruel as the grave. The savage 
man is a tiger, the civilized man a savage. It is as 
unreasoning as fate, cowardly as mean ; so shameful 
as to be without shame, and all men and all women 
will approve — nay applaud, as if the wrath were di- 
vine and the vengeance heroic. 

How grandly Christ accepted the position of 
judge, suddenly, from wicked motives, thrust upon 
Him, and clearly He measured the offense, and look- 
ing from the victim to the offended, rendered His 



68 Sunday Meditations. 

judgment. How touchingly beautiful His pardon: 
"And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn 
thee." It was for man to accuse and for man to con- 
demn. Our God, the Lord Jesus Christ, has no ac- 
cusation and no condemnation. 

There are some stars so remote in the depths of 
space from our earth, say astronomers, that their 
light has not yet reached us. In like manner there 
are some truths taught by Jesus that have not yet 
got to us. Traveling slowly but surely through the 
experience of the ages, they will reach humanity 
after humanity has been prepared for their reception. 
Nearer, oh ! Christ, to Thee, that we may shorten the 
space that shuts out Thy truths. 

As the qualities debased in prostitution are the 
most beautiful given us, the degradation is the deep- 
est. Upon those qualities rest all the sweet romance 
of youth, all the ennobling qualities of manhood, all 
that is tender and sweet in family ties. The home 
could not exist without them. On them is founded 
the holiest love the heart may know, in the love of a 
mother — in the strongest affection of which we are 
capable, that of the parent for the child. To have 
these dimmed, tarnished or destroyed is to take the 
beautiful from life and leave us only sin and shame. 

Christ wrote upon the ground as though He 
heard them not. 



Pity for the Fallen. 69 

He left the passions to still themselves, the tu- 
mult to subside, and when He lifted His God-like eyes 
and gazed upon them the decision went in advance 
of speech — yea, it had been decreed by the law of 
Moses that the woman taken in adultery should be 
stoned to death. That was the fate of the victim, 
but what of the offenders? Christ spoke through 
the law to the law-breakers, from the crime to the 
criminals : 

"He that is without sin among you, let him first 
cast a stone at her." 

That was his finding, that his judgment, and as it 
went to record, there it stands the law to-day. But 
how little heeded. The God-like presence of our Sa- 
vior aw 7 ed the brutal crowd, "And they w T ho heard it, 
being convicted by their own conscience, went out 
one by one, beginning with the eldest, even unto the 
last." But Christ being gone, they returned with 
stones in their hands — yes, stones in their pockets 
and stones in baskets — and for nearly nineteen hun- 
dred years they have been stoning to death the weak 
creatures they degraded, whom our God would not 
accuse nor condemn. 

Prostitution is the sale of one's self for the grat- 
ification of the purchaser, and Christ held the pur- 
chaser alone responsible. They who have made this 
loathsome subject a study tell us the one great cause 



70 Sunday Meditations. 

is poverty. There are other causes, of course, but 
they are as nothing to one found in destitution. The 
pangs of hunger, the lack of shelter, the absence of 
enough clothing to shield the frail body, these break 
down and destroy the sweet modesty of youth, the 
holy instincts of maternity, and all the pure attri- 
butes that fitted woman to be the mother of God and 
the salvation of humanity. In the fierce competition 
for the necessities of life, the hungry generations 
tread the weaker down, and then, devils as we are, 
we punish them for falling. 

Talk of the torture of the crucifixion. Great 
God ! let one go about our streets at night, or into 
those dens of pollution, and note what frail, delicate 
humanity can be made to suffer and still live. 

The average duration of life is that of the peni- 
tentiary and formerly that of the slaves on southern 
plantations. Five years of life, condensed into it a 
century of suffering. Look upon the poor painted 
creature upon the streets, and try to realize that she 
is of the same humanity that makes your mother, 
your sister, or your child. Once she was as pure and 
precious as they. Her wretched finery does not keep 
out the cold ; intoxication inflames without satisfying 
her hunger. She is sick without sympathy; her 
heart hungers for a home it can not find. The world 
to her is a world of beasts. She is outlawed. You 



Pity for the Fallen. 71 

can not swindle a rogue without being forced to 
restitution ; you can not "beat a rogue without being 
punished; but a fallen woman may be robbed, 
beaten — yea, murdered — with impunity. She can 
not appeal for protection and gain even a hearing. 
"It will not do," cry the Pharisees of to-day, " to 
recognize their existence by giving them aid, sympa- 
thy, or protection. Let us pretend that the evil does 
not exist/' And so we shut our eyes and ears to this 
horrible sin, although it grows upon us as poverty 
extends its gaunt presence, and, crowded out of ob- 
scure haunts, it invades public places and taints the 
atmosphere of all our thoroughfares. As the dura- 
tion of such life is, as we have said, an average of 
five years, we can see the multitude of helpless creat- 
ures this moloch consumes. We can not divest our- 
selves of the responsibility. We can not turn our 
backs on those Christ lived and died for. 

Stuff the cotton of your comfortable creed in 
your ears, close your saintly eyes as you sit in velvet- 
cushioned pews, and hear only the poundings upon 
the marble pulpit, for outside upon the corners, close 
upon your daily walks, the Christ whose mercy you 
ask is being crucified. We shudder at the burning 
of a hotel where many people are hurried into eter- 
nity. The wreck of a railroad train fills us with 
horror. We send missionaries to distant heathen, 



72 Sunday Meditations. 

while all about us, night and day, with thousands on 
thousands, degradation and death, in horrid torture, 
work, unrelieved and unmolested. 

We want the gospel of love and loving forgive- 
ness for the victim; stern, unrelenting justice for the 
wrong-doer. We must cease to be cruel. One virtue 
with us makes a man ; the loss of one ruins a woman. 
Give a man courage, and he is acceptable; suspect 
even a woman's chastity, and she is lost forever. 
Follow Christ. Avoid the sin, but seek the sinner. 
Remember that his beautiful days on earth, brief as 
they were, He passed among the poor, oppressed, and 
erring. Mary Magdalene walked with Him, and min- 
istered to His wants. Are you purer than Christ, 
that you should shrink from the poor, wretched 
Magdalenes of to-day? 

How common it is for us to count obstacles as 
impossibilities, and saying to our mean, cowardly na- 
tures, there is a lion in the path, turn from our duty. 
While the law punishes the victims, society seeks to 
ignore their existence. Even with the church itself, 
the refuge for the sufferer is a prison. " You have 
fallen, oh, my sister! Henceforth for you God's sun- 
light shines no more. The money changer, the miser 
abhorred of Christ, the thief, nay the murderer, being 
repentant, may again enjoy the sweets of life, with a 



Pity for the Fallen. 73 

hope of heaven ; but you, be buried alive, give your 
body to fasting and toil and your soul to prayer. 
For you, to whom Christ said kindly, ' neither do I 
condemn thee,' the world stands outside with stones 
for thy torture and thy death." 



74 Sunday Meditations. 



What me ome to Woman. 

" The Pharisees also came unto him, tempting 
him and saying unto him, Is it lawful for a man to 
put away his wife for every cause ? 

"And he answered and said unto them, Have 
ye not read that he which made them at the begin- 
ning made them male and female? 

"And said, For this cause shall a man leave 
father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife ; and 
they twain shall be one flesh ? 

" Wherefore they are no more twain, but one 
flesh. What therefore God hath joined together let 
no man put asunder." 

How slow the world is to appreciate what Christ 
did for humanity in lifting woman from her degra- 
dation to her appropriate sphere. To her we owe 
all that makes life endurable. From the mother 
comes the home and all that makes home beautiful. 
To her we are indebted for our manhood, indebted 
for the pure, sweet romance of youth, the strength 
of middle age, the dignity of and love for declining 
years. She rounds out and makes perfect our life, 
that were so broken and dreary with any part lost 
or destroyed. Before Christ old age was a burden. 



What we owe to Woman. 75 

Now the dimmed sight, the bending form and whit- 
ening head of the dear parent draw so strong upon 
the heart that we water the grave of the departed 
parent with the same bitter anguish we give the lit- 
tle narrow resting place of our first-born when cruel, 
relentless death takes our heart out of us in the loss. 

There were virtues known to humanity before 
the coming of our Savior. Love of country, honor 
among men and honest dealing were extolled and 
practiced. But they had no color, were cold and 
comfortless, until the woman in us was brought out 
and the forgiveness of sin, the love of the enemy and 
a belief in manhood for manhood's self, came to 
soften and sweeten life. 

Reason would have taught us the existence of 
God as science teaches us astronomy ; but only as 
naked, hard facts, from which, only half understand- 
ing, we shrink, appalled at the vastness of the con- 
ception. We had to be born again under the guid- 
ance of the son of Mary, blessed mother of God, to 
draw nearer in gladness to his holy presence. 

Christ left us but few precepts, but as the acorn 
holds the oak these few precepts hold all that are 
necessary to our happiness and our salvation. One 
wonders so little is said upon the subject of marriage, 
when seeing how much depends upon the home 
marriage makes possible, And yet the wife came 



76 Sunday Meditations. 

with the mother of God as daylight follows dawn. 
He walked from house to house in the land of the 
Hebrews, and He said nothing in rebuke of the abuse 
the patriarchal law entailed. He knew that in the 
fullness of time the abuse, under the holy teachings 
of His precepts, would disappear. In like manner He 
said render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, 
and unto God the things which are God's. Ah, 
well He knew that when the world came to recog- 
nize its Christ, pure democrat that He was, it would 
be an open question as to whether there was any 
thing due to Caesar, all being owed to God. 

He who confided His mission to His mother be- 
fore He gave it to the world ; who walked the earth 
the associate and friend of women ; who cast the devils 
from Mary Magdalene and made her His friend and 
companion ; who pardoned so kindly the woman con- 
demned to death for adultery — knew that man was 
but half made up without the fairer, kinder and more 
perfect part found in woman's nature. 

And so it comes that while the apostles saw 
Christ only on Calvary, we see Him at our hearth- 
stones and take Him, in our wives, children and pa- 
rents, to our hearts. 

The old heathen poet told of two loves that 
were gods of men's idolatry : One was of the earth — 
dark, fierce, turbulent and fickle; the other of 



What we owe to Woman. 77 

heaven — pure, steadfast and beautiful. The first is 
passion, the only love known to humanity before the 
coming of our Savior ; the other is affection, the love 
of the household. It may be that the earthly love 
urges on the union of two hearts, but it passes away, 
and the other enters, never to leave. How little, 
then, do they know of the true, binding tie of the 
household, of the home, who talk of free love ? There 
may be, as there doubtless is, a free passion, but there 
can be no such thing as free love. It is free lust — 
the wanton impulse of the beast — and can not be tied 
down to any law or made subject to any control. ISTor 
can it be destroyed. It is a part of our earthly na- 
ture and necessary to our existence, but woe awaits 
the poor creature who accepts it as a guide and builds 
upon its promise. The fire that is a good slave is no 
worse master. 

It is the unity of hopes, fears, joys, sorrows and 
of interests that creates the love of married life. And 
it grows stronger in sickness, sorrow and disappoint- 
ments, in proverty shared together, than in prosperity 
and the gladness of success. It can take a deeper 
root in one little grave, reach nearer heaven from 
that soil, in its flower-fringed branches, than it can 
from feasts and merry-makings. One's little wife 
may not be beautiful — no more than one's mother or 
one's child — but ah, she is the little wife from whose 



73 Sunday Meditations. 

kind eyes came consolation in the hour of disappoint- 
ment and perhaps shame. All the world may not be- 
lieve in you, but she believes in you. The mother 
of your children teaches them to love and reverence 
you, and her sad yet patient face, her gentle hands 
and loving heart, have held through all the years 
that little home a haven of rest and comfort, while 
the cruel world roared without. 

Free love ! Who wants to be freed from the 
love of his mother or the love of his child ? And, 
God help us, who wishes to be freed from the tie 
woven by little hands at the hearthstone, although 
the little hands have long since moldered into the 
dust of the grave ? 

How sweet it is to know that the homely ways 
of life are pleasant ways, and full of tenderness and 
beauty to us. In at the door comes the son of 
Mary, and life's cares are soothed and a sunshine 
from heaven lightens and beautifies all poor places, so 
that one looks upon them lovingly and remembers 
them in after life with tenderness and regret. They 
were hard days, ah, my wife, in that time of youth 
when we two made our little fight with the world, 
but love sweetened the toil and softened the disap- 
pointments, and out of the sickness, the sorrows, the 
failures, the death, came the reward that now makes 



What we owe to Woman. 79 

the life pleasant to the memory. In all the lands of 
Christendom are the homes, many rich and multitudes 
humble, but in all Christ dwells, bringing happiness. 
Blessed be the name of Christ, and blessed be the 
name of Mary, mother of Christ! 



80 Sunday Meditations. 



The Casting Oat of Devils. 

To one who studies the new testament with care, 
with loving care and tenderness, it is curious to find 
that while portions of the precious book are literally 
believed, others again, of equal importance, if any 
inequality can be found, are ignored and forgotten. 

The enforcement of some precepts has caused 
centuries of wars, and their so-called' propagandism 
has decimated the human race. It is a strange con- 
tradiction in poor human nature that made the Prince 
of Peace grand teacher of good will to men on earth, 
the author of the crudest persecutions and abuse the 
world ever knew. And because Christ said that his 
coming would cause dissensions we must not con- 
clude, as many do, that he sanctioned them. It was 
not until after his doctrines became respectable that 
they changed their character. It was when Chris- 
tianity passed from the keeping of the poor to the con- 
trol of the rich that men began to render unto Christ 
that which pertained to Caesar. The missionaries 
went forth with the Bible in one hand and the sword 
in the other, to enforce glory to God in the highest 
and good will and peace to men on earth. 

There are two phantoms — one fair and tempting, 



The Casting Oat of Devils. 81 

the other gaunt, ghastly and murderous — that fol- 
low close upon true religion, and are mistaken by the 
multitude for that which they only shadow and ob- 
scure. The one is fanaticism and the other law and 
order. They are the deadly enemies Christ denounced 
but did not destroy. Long years after His sacrifice 
the one took up, repaired and embroidered His sev- 
ered garment ; the other seized His cross, and sword 
in hand, sought to enforce, through violence, His pre- 
cepts of peace and forgivenness. 

This is mostly the Christianity of to-day in or- 
ganized religions. Now the conviction that is so in- 
tolerant that it will not bear opposition is a doubt. 
No man threatens you with death for disputing as 
a fact that the sun shines or does not shine. But 
when one has a painful doubt lurking at the base of 
his belief he grows furious at your encouragement 
of it. 

Thus it is that the Christianity which should be 
as open and broad and generous as the day is gath- 
ered in parcels and hid in churches, as if they were 
forts bristling with deadly arms against those who 
doubt as the sectarian himself doubts. 

Fanaticism is a grave evil, but it is mild because 
less insidious than Caesarism, which flings out the 
garb of Christ as the banner of law and order. 
Christianized Ceesarisrn is the attempt to render unto 



82 Sunday Meditations. 

one person both that which is Christ's and that which 
is Csesar's. It attempts to harmonize the gratifica- 
tions of the one with the self-denial of the other. It 
gilds the cross and makes it ornamental. It drapes 
the robe of our Savior over the purple and fine linen. 
It organizes charity, formalizes faith, and gives the 
sanction of the highest respectability to the hum- 
ble ISTazarene and His rude apostles. It calls in sci- 
ence and builds belief on geology, and stretches far 
into the heavens on astronomy. It purposes reach- 
ing heaven by easy stages, on a macadamized road 
that is comfortable and respectable. 

Of the two, fanaticism is the lesser evil. Better 
the violent conflict, the stake, the torture and great 
fights than thus to live with slow decay that ante- 
dates the death. Ah ! when Christ so bitterly de- 
nounced and doomed the rich man he realized the 
danger of riches. They eat into and destroy both 
true religion and its gaunt, cruel specter, fanaticism. 
An eloquent essayist tells us that the routes to shrines 
so long as they remain shrines, can be traced by hu- 
man bones of the pilgrims who perished while seek- 
ing the holy places. When these shrines change to 
marts of trade the roads grow safe, for men care 
more for their goods than their lives or their re- 
ligion. 

To accomplish this union of Christ and Csesar, 



The Casting Out of Devils. 83 

to make fanaticism possible, it was necessary to ig- 
nore certain parts of the new testament while earn- 
estly insisting upon a literal obedience to others. 

Among the miracles wrought by Christ, the one 
most dwelt upon in the testament is the casting out 
of devils ; and yet how few give the strange fact a 
second thought, and pause over an event such as this 
to ask, What can it mean? 

"And they came over unto the other side of the 
sea, into the country of the Gaderenes. 

"And when He was come out of the ship, im- 
mediately there met Him out of the tombs a man with 
an unclean spirit, 

" Who had his dwelling among the tombs ; and 
no man could bind him, no, not with chains ; 

" Because that he had been often bound with 
fetters and chains, and the chains had been plucked 
asunder by him, and the fetters broken in pieces ; 
neither could any man tame him. 

"And always, night and day, he was in the 
mountains and in the tombs, crying and cutting him- 
self with stones. 

"But when he saw Jesus afar off, he ran and 
worshiped Him. 

"And cried with a loud voice and said, What 
have I to do with Thee, Jesus, thou Son of the Most 



84 Sunday Meditations. 

High God ? I adjure thee bv God that thou torment 
me not. 

" (For He said unto him, Come out of the man, 
thou unclean spirit). 

"And He asked him, What is thy name ? And 
he answered, saying, My name is Legion ; for we 
are many." 

We are aware that wise doctors of divinity, and 
learned doctors of medicine have after consultation, 
told the Christian world that this being possessed of 
devils meant that the afflicted were insane. Clearly 
as words can express His meaning, Christ does not 
teach this. He tells us not once, but frequently, that 
it is demonianism. Now either Christ knew that the 
poor creatures were insane, and yet was willing to 
pander to the superstition of the day, or He was ig- 
norant of the wonderful fact the science of medicine 
has since claimed to develop. 

We may close our precious book and shut out 
revealed religion on either proposition. 

No, Christ teaches us all that later experience 
confirms : that lying outside the little circle of our 
material life, and sometimes penetrating it, is a world 
of life other than our own, that more or less influ- 
ences our earthly existence. And what significance 
this gives to prayer — that cry for help to the unseen 
Holy to save us from the control of the unseen evil. 



The Casting Out of Devils. 85 

How much have we done in life that, looking back 
upon, we wonder at — follies that seem to have been 
without motive. 'No less of sin. Who upon any 
other ground can account for the boy murderer of 
New England, whose horrible butcheries of children 
till one with horror and amazement? We are told 
that there is a flow in the tide of our vitality that 
reaches its lowest ebb between midnight and dawn, 
when the dying release their hold of life and pass 
away. It is between those hours we waken to turn 
and toss upon a couch that seems to be surrounded 
by a strange, weird atmosphere, through which we 
look upon our own follies and sins as they never ap- 
pear at other times. How close we are upon the bor- 
der line between this life and the life to come, and 
from mysterious influences we can only feel what 
strange promptings are given us. 

Are not the dead about us; and if demons may 
possess the bodies of men, may not the good spirits 
lend a holy influence to the better promptings of the 
soul? Christ has so taught. His prayers were ad- 
dressed to his Heavenly Father as a child's petition is 
to the loving heart of a tender parent. The world is 
full to-day of strange manifestations that startle the 
multitude and confound the learned. We thought to 
have exhausted in our knowledge the laws of nature 
and explored to their farthest mystery all there was 



86 Sunday Meditations. 

to comprehend. The result is faith in ourselves, but 
no faith in Christ or Christ's teachings. We have 
built to ourselves a religion on science, and sent our 
astronomical God far from us, into the depths of 
never-ending space. All less than this is supersti- 
tion, ignorance, and falsehood. The dead material- 
ism of the day rejects all else than that which touches 
the senses. To the educated of our time the earth 
rolls, cold and Godless, through eternal space. 
Christ is dead and forgotten, and beyond the brief 
troubles of our little life there is naught". This fright- 
ful condition does not yet touch the poor nor the 
earnest teachers of the church, but when it does, God 
in his mercy will send the sheeted dead to walk our 
streets, to waken us from an unbelief that is worse 
than annihilation. 



Good One Day in Seven. 87 



Good One Day in Seven. 

We formally set aside one seventh of our time 
for meditation upon holy subjects and prayer to God 
for divine protection. This is less than fourteen and 
a half per cent taken from our sins and devoted to 
our souls. Is it, then, of so little importance to us 
that we can afford to thus trifle with it ? What 
business man, what merchant is there who would 
prosper in his undertakings who would thus give to 
them so small a part of his time and attention ? Is 
this policy of insurance, with its payment of four- 
teen and a half per cent for a treasure in heaven, 
what Christ contemplated in his teachings? Here is 
what he says : 

" ISTo man can serve two masters ; for either he 
will hate the one and love the other, or else he will 
hold to the one and despise the other. Ye can not 
serve God and mammon." 

The Christian of to-day illustrates the truth of 
what our Savior uttered, for he has compromised 
theoretically upon giving one-seventh of his time to 
Christ, and ends practically in devoting all of it to 
mammon. The fever of the week will not end its 
inflamed throbbings at our bidding upon Sunday, 



88 Sunday Meditations. 

and the servitor of the world carries to the house of 
God all the care and anxieties of the week. The 
prayer becomes a mere formality, the song of praise 
beats unmeaningly upon the ear, for the mind fol- 
lows the troubled heart back to the counting-room 
or work-shop, or field, or office, where the hopes and 
fears are. 

It is so hard to learn that revealed religion has 
reference almost exclusively to this life. Christ's 
precepts teaching us how to live are few, simple, 
direct and easily understood, while all -that He said 
of life hereafter was spoken in parables, and they, 
too, begin and end with the preparation necessary 
this side of the grave to fit us for the unknown here- 
after. 

As well might one hope to have the soul lifted 
from earth into heaven by the divine music garnered 
from the centuries by the church, without being 
taught and trained to comprehend the strains, as to 
expect to enjoy the heaven promised us without the 
life-long preparation left us by Christ. To one born 
blind light is as unknown as the religion of our 
Savior to the worshiper of mammon, Such blind fol- 
lowers, believing in the goodness of God and the 
forgiveness of sins, fondly hope that after all mercy 
will intervene and undo all that justice has decreed. 
They little dream that they make such mercy im- 



Good One Day in Seven. 89 

possible. Study the laws of our physical being and 
note how inexorable they are. They never forgive. 
The wrong done our body, be it in mutilation of 
limb or to the injury of our health, is followed with 
fatal certainty by punishment against which we cry 
in vain. "We were shown at Mt. Yernon a bullet 
that had been shot into the bark of a tree. It had 
healed over and the tree continued to grow, and here, 
after a hundred years, the bullet was found, the re- 
mote but positive cause of its fall. All about the 
wound the stubborn fiber had hardened into knots 
until slow decay brought death at last. And about 
the wound of our moral nature goes on the harden- 
ing of the heart so often spoken of by Christ. God 
may forgive the sinner, but never the sin. We may 
nurse the broken limb and salve over the wound, but 
the mutilation ever remains. How terrible the 
thought that every wrong done our moral nature has 
like consequences, and that we are doomed to enter 
the great hereafter maimed and sick. 

After telling us that we can not serve two mas- 
ters, how earnestly he warns us against the cares of 
this life, the hard service of mammon : 

" Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought 
for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall 
drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. 



90 Sunday Meditations. 

Is not the life more than meat, and the body than 
raiment ? 

" Behold the fowls of the air : for they sow 
not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns ; yet 
your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not 
much better than they? 

"Which of you, by taking thought, can add 
one cubic unto his stature ? 

"And why take ye thought for raiment ? Con- 
sider the lilies of the field, how they grow ; they 
toil not, neither do they spin : 

"And yet I say unto you that even Solomon, 
in all his glory, was not arrayed like one of these. 

" Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the 
field, which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into 
the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O, ye 
of little faith. 

" Therefore take no thought, saying, What 
shall we eat ? or, What shall we drink ? or, Where- 
withal shall we be clothed ? 

"(For after all these things do the Gentiles 
seek) ; for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye 
have need of all these things. 

"But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and 
his righteousness ; and all these things shall be added 
unto you, 

"Take therefore no thought for the morrow: 



Good One Day in Seven. 91 

for the morrow shall take thought for the things of 
itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." 

How sweet and soothing are these words coming 
from Christ to the anxious, careworn sons of toil. 
Look up, be cheerful. God lives; the seasons come 
and go each in its appointed time, changeless in their 
change ; the earth, hard as it is upon the children of 
men, has yet flowers that bloom and birds that sing, 
and the pleasant sunlight is every- where. The strug- 
gle, hard as it is on earth, is but brief. A hundred 
years hence, and where will be these cares and hopes 
and fears ? Be content, be kind to each other, and re- 
member that we are all children of the kind Father 
who cares for the birds and flowers, said Christ, and 
therefore cares for us. 

How much of the misery of this life comes from 
those brooding anxieties, from imaginary troubles. 
Alas! 

11 We look before and after, we sigh for what is not; 
Our sincerest laughter with some pain is fraught. 
Our sweetest songs are those which tell of saddest thought." 

What mother hath left her child for a time, and 
returning found its eyes widened with fear and its 
little lips trembling, but takes the infant into her 
arms, and says : " Don't fear, my babe ; I was not far 



92 Sunday Meditations. 

away; I am with you?" And so Christ gathers us 
to Him, and so He gives us tender assurance of His 
loving care. 

Nor must we be guilty of the common error, the 
sin, for such it is, of supposing that in this or aught 
else left us by our Savior, we are to despise this life 
or turn from this world, believing^ thereby that we 
are making ourselves more acceptable to Him. This 
earth is a beautiful earth, given us not to abuse, but 
enjoy. It is full of pleasant ways for innocent en- 
joyments that purify and elevate our nature. Note 
in the sermon to the toiling, care-worn millions, how 
lovingly and gently He speaks of the lilies of the 
fields. He had seen and loved the flowers, as He had 
seen and heard the birds. He briefly referred to 
these in illustration of what He sought to teach. But 
had He not also looked upon the lofty mountains, 
along whose sides to-day the cloud shadows chase 
each other, on the solemn woods, or the ever-chang- 
ing sea, and loved them as He did the flowers and 
birds ? How often, in his houseless wanderings, had 
He seen the sun go down, then, as now, unchanged, 
in all these centuries, in its still glory of cloud dra- 
pery, and gazing into the depths with His tender, beau- 
tiful eyes, through the glowing sea of fading light, 
to the cold, chilling, never-ending space beyond, felt 



The Need of Faith. 93 

as feels the Christian to-day, that God is good to 
give us, even for this brief life, such a lovable home. 
All, then, that is beautiful in nature, all that is re- 
fined and elevating in art, are ours to enjoy. 



94 Sunday Meditations, 



The Seed of Faith. 

"And when He was entered in a ship His disci- 
ples followed Him. 

"And behold there arose a great tempest in the 
sea, insomuch that the ship was covered with the 
waves ; but He was asleep. 

"And His disciples came to Him and awoke Him, 
saying, Lord save us; we perish. 

"And he saith unto them, Why are ye fearful, O 
ye of little faith? Then He arose and rebuked the 
winds and the sea ; and there was a great calm. 

" But the men marveled, saying, What manner 
of man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey 
him?" 

The lesson sought to be taught us in this touch- 
ingly beautiful narrative of a strange event in the 
life of Christ is the importance of faith. ' " ye of 
little faith," cried our Savior when awakened by His 
terror-stricken disciples. They had seen Him per- 
forming miracles with the power of G-od ; they had 
seen the peoples moved by His godlike presence and 
His words of divine wisdom, and the wild winds of 
the stormy night and the yeasty waves drove out 
from their minds that they were with their master, 



The Need of Faith 95 

whose ill man alone could compass. He spoke to the 
winds and the waves ; lie said, " peace, be still," and 
the winds, thus rebuked, ceased, and the wild waves 
subsided. 

To how many storms raging in our own hearts, 
filling our being with fear, despair, the anguish of 
wicked disorder, dark as the clouded night and 
wilder than the wildest storm that ever tossed law- 
lessly along a boundless deep, storms that have 
changed our being and driven us out to deeds of vio- 
lence and cruelty — to how many such storms have 
we awakened our Savior that He might cry " Peace, 
be still," and so give us rest and hope and happiness. 

After all the centuries the faith is as necessary 
to us as when the wearied Son of Man sank to sleep 
upon that troubled sea. And what a picture those 
few simple words present to the thoughtful mind. 
Through the ages that have followed His advent men 
have so accustomed themselves to regard their Christ 
as their God, that His labors, trials and sufferings on 
earth as a man are obscured. He was one of our own 
helpless race, and all the ills that beset us were his to 
encounter. We are prone to say to ourselves, " But 
he was God — what are our sufferings to the Al- 
mighty ? " And so Christ passes from us. To retain 
the truth in all its vividness we must return to the 






96 Sunday Meditations. 

story as told by his apostles. Preceding this very 
miracle we are told : 

"Now, when Jesus saw great multitudes about 
Him He gave commandment to depart unto the other 
side. 

"And a certain scribe came and said unto Him, 
Master, I will follow Thee whithersoever Thou 
goest. 

"And Jesus said unto him, The foxes have holes 
and the birds of the air have nests ; but the Son of 
Man hath not where -to lay his head: 

"And another of His disciples said unto Him, 
Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. 

" But Jesus said unto him, Follow me, and let 
the dead bury their dead." 

He was weary. He sought to end the labors of 
the day, and the multitude that gathered about, 
poor, hungry hearts, would have more. They sought 
to look upon His kind face, they longed for His 
strangely wise utterances, and so He sought refuge 
in the vessel that was to carry Him and His disciples 
to the other side. And how sad is his response to 
the scribe, " The foxes have holes and the birds of 
the air have nests, but the Son of Man hath not 
where to lay his head." 

He does not say the son of God, but of man. 



The Need of Faith. 



97 



He was given on other occasions to referring- to His 
Father in heaven ; but now, footsore and weary, 
hungry and sick at heart, He tells the scribe that He 
has no home in which, among loving hearts, He can 
find shelter. He hath no place to lay His head. Ah ! 
blessed head, how we long to pillow it upon our ten- 
derest affections ! How we long to give the one 
friend of humanity a home ! And yet who among 
us is more kind, more patient, more charitable, with 
all the love we express and all the. teachings His 
words and example have left us? 

He went aboard the rude vessel to escape the 
multitude, and like a tired child lay down to sleep. 
He was so wearied, so. worn out, that the great storm, 
with its fierce winds and waves that washed the 
decks, did not disturb His deep repose. Christ slept. 
God never sleeps. How difficult it is for us to recog- 
nize the dignity of truth. A fact to be acceptable 
must not be homely. The Jews would not accept 
their Messiah for that He was born in a manger. 
More stupid than the Hebrews, we will not permit 
Him to remain there. They expected Him to come in 
glory and power, and we lift Him there, not content 
with his lowly lot, and so we misuse the truth. The 
inexperienced hunter looks a mile away for game 
that springs up at his feet. We can not see that in 



98 Sunday Meditations. 

our anxiety to make Him other than He was we deny 
Christ as completely as did the Jews. They could 
not see him in the humhle carpenter born in a stable ; 
we can not see him as man at all. 

Far darker and more painful is that skepticism 
that shuts him out entirely. This is the horrible 
teaching of to-day. We are wiser than Christ; 
we are more learned than His simple disciples and 
the blind followers of all the generations who ac- 
cepted the faith He taught with the simple confi- 
dence of children. We are wiser than they. We 
accept only what we can comprehend. We dispense 
with faith for the light of learning. Alas ! the old- 
est sage, the wisest of men, after a lifetime of 
thought, closes his book, and looking out upon crea- 
tion with his study-dimmed eyes, says mournfully : 
"After all these years of thought and research I have 
been taught to know that I know nothing." He has 
counted the age of the earth by the unerring records 
of geology, and footing up the millions of years, 
finds before and after the incomprehensible eternity. 
He has reached the stars, and beyond lies, what? 
Never ending, incomprehensible space. He can not 
comprehend the very sunlight ; no, nor a little flower, 
nor a blade of grass, nor, above all, himself. 

We accept the sunlight we can not understand ; 



The Need of Faith. 



99 



we enjoy the flower. In like manner must we take 
to our hearts the divine precepts of the Master, and 
above all the faith that lifts from our troubled hearts 
all the dark brooding cares of this life, and all the 
painful doubts of the life hereafter. 



100 Sunday Meditations, 



Confession of Sin. 

u And when He had said this He breathed on 
and said unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost : 

" Whosesoever sins ye remit they are remitted 
unto them; whosesoever sins ye retain they are re- 
tained." 

How humanity, in all its needs, hopes, fears, in 
all its weakness and strength, remains the same 
through recorded centuries, the brief story of Christ's 
life and teachings tell us. With all our progress in 
material prosperity we are to-day the same feeble 
creatures that gathered about our Savior and followed 
him as the flock follows the shepherd into desert 
places, that they might get comfort and wisdom from 
His beautiful words. 

And why should it be otherwise ? Let us build 
to ourselves grand houses, give to each a palace of 
stout walls and double-plated windows and strong 
doors ; let us make to ourselves summer in the dead of 
winter, and cool retreats from the heat of summer, 
and wasting disease and ghastly death will enter and 
abide with us. We may build against the wild ele- 
ments, shut out the burning sun, the biting winter 
wind ; but we can not build against the ills of life, 



Confession of Sin. 101 

that are part of our nature. Where are the walls 
that can shield us from ingratitude, chilled affection, 
selfishness, avarice, meanness and the thousand ills that 
flesh is heir to ? Said a friend : " I went to the pal- 
ace of the rich man with the petition of a poor widow 
dying of a cancer, who asked relief for her hungry 
and helpless children. I waited in rooms where art 
had exhausted its last resource in all that was beau- 
tiful. Huge mirrors extending from floor to ceiling 
seemed to double the wealth of palatial decorations. 
The ceilings were gems of frescoed excellence ; the 
walls had fortunes in the form of pictures on every 
panel ; all that has been done in bronze and marble 
to revive the almost lost science of Greek beauty ap- 
peared in every recess ; the carpet beneath my feet, 
woven by hand, had probably a poor laborer's life in 
every square foot. And while I waited for the serv- 
ant to carry in my card I heard a moan from the 
sick room within so sad, deep and agonizing that it 
seemed to come from the very grave. I thought I 
had left with the poor dying widow all the misery of 
which life is capable. That moan taught me my er- 
ror. Death, the great democrat, knows no distinc- 
tion." 

This is so well recognized that its utterance is 
a platitude. It is common-place, worn so thread- 
bare that while the preacher speaks it from his pul- 



102 Sunday Meditations. 

pit his congregation sleeps. We all continue strug- 
gling fiercely for these things, as if their possession 
lifted us above all suffering and made disease and 
death our friends, in the way we want them. And 
if it is not worldly possessions that own us it is some 
fevered ambition worse than bodily sickness. 

And yet all the real estate a king may possess, 
with forests of brown Rembrandts' depths of lighted 
gloom, and sunny fields and lofty mountains, does 
not hold as much of the human heart as one little 
grave. The cemeteries of the earth are after all the 
kingdoms of earth, and hold in their narrow limits 
all that we possess. 

And how do we feed our little vanity over our 
material progress, and claim that humanity is wiser, 
better, happier from what we have gained ? The iron 
rails with which we so laboriously network our land 
fetch wide points closer together, while the telegraph 
seems to annihilate space. And how are we better? 
The telegraph sets shores world-wide apart to whis- 
pering to each other. Has that telegraph reached 
that other life, and can it fetch to us a loving word 
from the dead in whose graves we buried our earthly 
happiness ? 

Poor creatures are we after all. The coral reefs 
of the South seas come up from unknown depths to 
present great sea-walls against the ever stormy, rest- 



Confession of Sin. 



103 



less ocean, and so solid and enduring that man can 
not imitate them. And the builder is a worm. 

The Church of Christ is founded on the wants 
of humanity, and in its relief no greater is given than 
that found in confession. A sin once committed 
seems to burn into our being until we find relief in tell- 
ing of it to another. This is a trait in human nature 
even when uninfluenced by religious feeling. " To 
make a clean breast of it " is a popular saying that 
every one recognizes. To tell of the dark transac- 
tion even when confided in confidence to another 
seems to give that other a share of the burden. What 
parent is there who has not remarked the sense of re- 
lief the little one seems to experience after telling 
through tears and with trembling lips of some 
transgression that has lain like lead upon the little 
heart ? Who of those learned in the law, with prac- 
tice among criminals, has not noted in his client the 
same result ? 

This is not remorse — it is the reverse of that. 
Remorse means simply the fear. of detection. The 
murderer, for example, lives in the constant dread 
that his horrible secret, that he has sought to bury 
with his victim, may be brought to light ; and in his 
effort to hide he oftentimes betrays his crime. No, the 
fact remains that we feel instinctively that there is a 
process through which the sin-laden soul can be re- 



104 Sunday Meditations. 

lieved, to gain which the self-convicted is willing to 
brave discovery and accept punishment. 

What a power, then, this gives to confession as 
a part of our religion ! Who among us, when 
troubled with some vexatious worldly affair has not 
found comfort in transferring the case to the keeping 
of a lawyer? Who, when watching by the bedside 
of some loved sufferer, has not felt relieved when the 
long-expected physician comes to share the responsi- 
bility? In the same way, but far more effectual, we 
go humbly to the good minister of God, our advocate 
before the bar of the Almighty, our physician of the 
soul, to relieve our inner being of its heavy burden. 
It is prayer reduced to practice ; it is making a reality 
of an emotional desire to be cured. Trouble not your 
soul, oh ! Christian, as to what may be between your 
minister and his Master. Judge not lest ye be 
judged, when God alone is the arbiter. Remember 
that of the twelve ordained by the sacred hands of 
Christ himself, none were perfect, from Peter who de- 
nied to Judas who betrayed Him. Let us look in 
deep humility to our own transgressions, leaving the 
ordained to answer for themselves at that awful 
tribunal where in the end we must all appear. 



The Love of the Beautiful. 



105 



The Love of the Beautiful. 



"And they send unto him certain of the 
Pharisees and of the Herodians, to catch him in 
His words. 

" And when they were come they say unto Him, 
Master, we know that Thou art true, and carest for 
no man ; for Thou regardest not the person of men, 
but teachest the way of God in truth. Is it lawful to 
give tribute to Caesar or not? 

" Shall we give, or shall we not give ? But He, 
knowing their hypocrisy, said unto them, Why tempt 
ye Me? Bring Me a penny that I may see it. 

"And they brought it. And He said unto them, 
Whose is this image and superscription ? And they 
said unto Him, Caesar's. 

"And Jesus answering, said unto them, Render 
to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the 
things that are God's. And they marveled at Him." 

The heathenish tendency so marked among 
modern sects, to seek the favor of the Creator by a 
contempt for His works, has really no foundation in 
the teachings of our Savior. Of all this beautiful 
earth, with its flowers, birds, sunny fields, and solemn 
wood, its shadow-haunted mountains, and restless 



106 Sunday Meditations. 

seas, its ever-changing seasons, and glories of light, 
that are of the earth, man alone is vile. And yet he 
seeks to win favor by affecting to despise all that is 
better than himself. 

It is not possible that He who had such an un- 
bounded love for his fellow men should not have as 
kindly looked upon the humbler but more perfect 
work of the Creator. " In the many mansions of my 
Father's house there is room for all his creatures." 
And the house was not larger than His heart, that 
gathered in and held lovingly and .tenderly all living 
things. The very sparrows that sold in the market 
two for a penny were known and cared for by our 
Savior, who gave His heart's blood in testimony of 
the truth, that not only opened heaven to us here- 
after, but tendered peace and good will to the human 
family on earth. 

The humility He continually teaches has in it no 
degradation, no slavish, superstitious bending of hu- 
manity before a vindictive God, but the humility that 
takes from us the false pride that arrogates to an ant- 
hill all of creation. For how many thousands of 
years did the human family see the sun rise in the 
east and set in the west, and say this light was made 
for us, and for us only ! How science took the sun 
from us and gave it to such depths of space the mind 
of man can not comprehend them ! How science re- 



The Love of the Beautiful. 



107 



moves God Himself, making Him the center of that 
which has no center, for it has no limits ! But science 
no more than Christ can take the false pride out of 
our nature. As heaven was made for us earth is to 
be despised. We mangle, and abuse, and feed on the 
inferior animals, and yet the poor creature we muti- 
late and torture through our work is no more ours 
than the sun that we now gaze upon in awe ; and 
that is after all only the one light in millions on 
millions that illumine the portals of God's creation. 

All that we win from unfeeling matter, all that 
we make our own from the elements, are ours, so far 
as w r e may control and use them. But these dumb 
animals, with their pitiful, pleading eyes, are not ours 
to torture, abuse, and kill. This is the pride, the vain 
conceit, Christ would have taken from us, and not the 
love of the beautiful of earth, for the keen enjoy- 
ment of which He has given us such a great 
capacity. 

A great philosopher has told us that we may re- 
peat a truth until it loses all meaning. We may add 
that a falsehood can be dwelt upon through genera- 
tions, until it becomes in the minds of men a truth. 
Of this sort is that fanatical self-denial that finds no 
good on this earth and reserves its conceited self for 
the heaven of the hereafter. God is to be insulted, if 
that were possible, by a loud condemnation of His 



108 Sunday Meditations. 

works on earth, and with puritanical hypocrisy we 
are to turn our backs on Him and His in a vain effort 
to make ourselves other than what we are. It is well 
to go to our closets and confess our sins in secret to 
our Creator, but to fit ourselvesv for that holy com- 
munion it is good to show some kindness to the poor 
creatures dependent upon our care, to extend Chris- 
tian charity and forgiveness to our fellow-men, and, 
above all, to be prepared to thank our heavenly 
Father for this beautiful earth, and to ask His aid to 
fit us better for its inheritance. 

"Would we pass our Sundays in meditation, let 
us go to the fields and woods, or down by the ever- 
changing sea, and drink in God's goodness in His 
beautiful works. Nor is it to be found in nature 
only. Art is as much His as aught else. Who has 
stood before the grand old cathedrals of Europe, 
where the humble faith of generations is worked in 
columns and arches and towers until the marble 
mocks the clouds, or knelt within where one's pray- 
ers seem carried to heaven on great waves of melody, 
and not felt the soul lifted above the cares and pains 
and disappointments of this life ? 

And with what beautiful simplicity He makes 
answer to these cunning inquisitors : " Render unto 
Csesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the 
things that are God's." He had asked for a coin, 



The Love of the Beautiful. 109 

and uttered those grand words over the money. The 
Jews had a government that was a theocracy, their 
politics were their religion, and their legal enact- 
ments came direct, they claimed, from God himself. 
But Csesar had intervened, and separating religion, 
such as it was, from government, brutal as that was, 
built a foundation for a double duty. It was little 
that Christ gave to Caesar, and all that was left he 
gave to God. Our duties as a citizen harmonize 
with our religious obligations. We may pay tribute 
to the power that gives us law and order, but noth- 
ing beyond. 

Municipal government is for the benefit of the 
governed, and the tribunal to try such is in the gov- 
erned. The brutal conquest of the weak by the 
strong, the lust of power, and the greed of gain, that 
pervert governments from their just ends, create no 
just demand for the tribute Christ authorized to 
Csesar. 

We, however, have improved upon the Csesarism 
of the day in which Christ spoke. A deadlier enemy 
to Christianity appears in that Csesarism that seeks 
to make religion fashionable. Christ was denied by 
the Jews because he was born in a stable and was by 
trade a carpenter. The humble mechanic is ignored 
and a god substituted. Were our Savior to reappear 
on earth, with the lowly following of fishermen and 



110 Sunday Meditations. 

tent-makers, our church members would be horrified 
and gravely disheartened. 

Our religious Csesarism elbows poverty out into 
the cold, for that it is not respectable. It would go 
hard with it to make an exception in behalf of the 
Divine Founder of Christianity and his chosen twelve. 
Yet He has said to us that a slight to or abuse of the 
humblest is an offense to Him that will rob us of the 
heaven hereafter. And well it may. If we can not 
receive the poor in our churches because of their 
poverty, how can we find happiness in their associa- 
tion when they are to meet their Divine Master and 
friend ? 

We have so arranged our Caesarism that we can 
be religious without being moral. The good will to 
man on earth is lost in the glory to God in the high- 
est, and the glory resolves itself in mere forms that 
are as dry and hollow as husks. The husks may be 
gilded, but they are husks all the same. Christ gave 
little to Csesar and much to God, and we give little 
to God and much to Cfesar — for are they not one ? 
Ah ! let us return, and, filling our empty pitchers at 
the divine fountain, prepare for heaven by develop- 
ing heaven as Christ taught us on earth. 



Blind by the Wayside. 



Ill 



Blind by the Wayside. 

"And it came to pass that as He was come nigh 
unto Jericho a certain blind man sat by the wayside 
begging; 

"And hearing the multitude pass by he asked 
what it meant ; 

"And they told him that Jesus of Nazareth 
passeth by. 

"And he cried, saying, Jesus, thou Son of David, 
have mercy on me. 

"And they which went before rebuked him, that 
he should hold his peace ; but he cried so much the 
more, Thou Son of David, have mercy on me. 

"And Jesus stood, and commanded him to be 
brought unto Him, and when he was come near He 
asked him, 

" Saying, What wilt thou that I shall do unto 
thee? And he said, Lord, that I may receive my 
sight. 

"And Jesus said unto him, Receive thy sight, 
thy faith hath saved thee. 

"And immediately he received his sight, and fol- 
lowed Him, glorifying God ; and all the people, when 
they saw it, gave praise unto God." 



112 Sunday Meditations. 

Of all the afflictions to which poor humanity is 
liable among the saddest is the loss of sight. To 
those possessed of wealth and surrounded by friends 
it is to be a helpless object of compassion ; but when 
to this is added poverty how horrible is the affliction. 
Those we love, who may demand our care through 
our affection, and own the means to save them from 
want, the sense of dependence, the loss of so much 
that makes life even endurable, are troubles hard to 
endure ; but when the patient gropes helplessly along 
the highways of life, thrust aside in the cruel compe- 
tition of hungry, heartless multitudes, trampled upon 
and abused, suffering from hunger, thirst, shivering 
in the pitiless winds of winter or fainting in the 
heats of summer, how horrible is his or her fate! 
Nothing but that great blank night forever about 
one ; nothing but one's thoughts, dreary as the moon- 
less, starless night for all time, until death adds the 
tomb and brings relief! 

With what touching truth Milton tells of this 
in his Samson Agonistes. When we remember that 
the immortal poet is speaking of himself the beau- 
tiful words have a touching significance : 

" O, loss of sight, of thee I must complain ! 
Blind among enemies, O, worse than chains, 
Dungeon of beggary, or decrepid age ! 
Light, the prime work of God, to me 's extinct, 



Blind by the Wayside. 113 

And all her various objects of delight 

Annull'd which nfght in part my grief have eased — 

Inferior to the vilest now become 

Of man or worm, the vilest here excel me ; 

They creep, yet see — I dark in light, exposed 

To daily fraud, contempt, abuse and wrong ; 

Within doors or without, still as a fool 

In power of others, never in my own ; 

Scarce half I seem to live, dead more than half — 

0, dark, dark, dark amid the blaze of noon, 

Irrevocably dark, total eclipse 

Without all hope of day. 

O, first created beam, and thou great word, 

Let there be light,' and light was over all, 

Why am I thus bereaved thy prime degree ? 

The sun to me is dark 

And silent as the moon 

When she deserts the night, 

Hid in her vacant interluner cave. 

Since light so necessary is to life, 

And almost life itself, if it be true 

That life is in the soul, 

She all in every part — why was the sight 

To such a tender ball as th' eye confined, 

So obvious and so easy to be quenched, 

And not as feeling through all parts diffused, 

That she might look at will through every pore ? 

Then had I not been thus exiled from light, 

As in the land of darkness yet in light 

To live a life half dead, a living death, 
And buried ; but 0, yet more miserable, 
Myself, my sepulcher, a moving grave — 

10 



114 Sunday Meditations. 

Buried, yet not exempt, 

By privilege of death and burial, 

From worst of other evils, pains and wrongs, 

But made hereby obnoxious more 

To all the miseries of life." 

What a cry of agony is there ! What must be 
the suffering that comes up and reaches the heart 
through beautiful words. The expressions of pain, 
whether of body or mind, are generally wails with- 
out words. The next to reach our inner feeling and 
make us sympathize with the sufferer are homely ex- 
pressions. They are the truest eloquence. To know 
this one has only to compare the sad utterances of 
Christ when, wearied and depressed, He turned from 
the multitude, whose sick He had healed, and to 
whose mental and moral wants He had ministered, to 
a certain scribe who had proposed to follow Him to 
His home, and said, " The foxes have holes and the 
birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man hath 
not where to lay His head." To compare this to the 
stately poetic utterances of the blind poet : The one, 
with his great heart longing for love and sympathy, 
stands alone. In all the world there is no home for 
Him— not one friend upon whom He can lean — no 
home in which He can find rest. And He tells this in 
homely words, that come nearer to the inarticulate 
cry of suffering. The other, in a burst of agony, re- 



Blind by the Wayside. 115 

lates his terrible doom, but in such stately, measured 
poetry that the beauty of the utterance robs it of 
half our sympathy. 

We once waited on an eminent physician of 
Paris who made diseases of the eye a specialty. He 
gave two hours every day to the poor, who thronged 
his rooms for medical treatment, for he was famous 
as a learned man of quiet judgment and rare wisdom. 
Waiting for our turn, we saw him approach a poor 
girl : 

" You are quite blind, my child ?" 

" Quite blind, Monsieur=" 

He examined the clouded balls, turning up the 
lids gently, and said : 

" You should have come to me a year ago ; you 
have been sadly neglected, and yet I believe I can 
help you." 

A blind smile, pitiful to look on, came to the 
face of the poor girl. The joy that cometh with the 
morn already shone in upon her darkened being. 

To another woman he said, after a careful diag- 
nosis : 

" I can not help you — your case is past medical 
skill." " 

Ah, God ! what a look of wild despair paled into 
that poor face as, with trembling lips, that could ut- 
ter no sound, she turned away ! 



116 Sunday Meditations. 

And a strong man tottered to a chair ; on hear- 
ing his doom he uttered a cry that went straighter 
to the heart than all the solemn, measured sentences 
of the blind Milton. 

They, these poor people, could not see much; 
but they saw probably the poor, dependent little 
ones ahungered and cold, turned out upon the world 
without their bread-winner, to starve. 

We thought were this physician Christ, could he 
by a single word restore the sight, how readily 
would the crowd fall down and worship him. 

And so He went about the earth healing the sick 
and giving comfort to the afflicted, when it came to 
pass, as He drew near unto Jericho, a blind beggar 
sitting by the wayside heard the multitude go by. 
The ear, quickened by the loss of sight, caught the 
name of the strange being who went among the 
children of men curing the lame so that they walked, 
and the dying so that they lived, and the blind so 
that they saw. What a thrill of hope shot through 
his darkened being ! Ah ! if he would only heal 
him — and he cried out. Christ heard the cry. What 
appeal from afflicted humanity does He not hear? 
And while His followers rebuked the agonized suf- 
ferer, He turned and bade them fetch the blind man 
to Him, and Jesus said to him, "Receive thy sight — 
thy faith hath saved thee." 



Blind by the Wayside. 



117 



And yet to us, after the centuries, it is but a 
parable. How many of us sitting blind by the high- 
way of life hear Christ going by and do not cry out, 
" Jesus, Son of David, have mercy upon me ? " 

True, it lias been told us that if we ask it will 
be given us; if we knock it will be opened to us, for 
His love is as boundless as His forgiveness. But it is 
the law of our being that some one time in our life 
the good we seek passes within reach, and Christ, 
without our seeking, comes to us. Ah, me ! how 
seldom it is that the quickened hearing of the blind 
catch the meaning of the sound, as salvation sweeps 
by, and cry out for help from the Son of God. Alas ! 
it is our fate to be born blind; the aching, the 
troubled soul can not know the blessing, the joy of 
that light that, through the door of heaven opened 
by our blessed Savior, flows down, filling our world, 
making all things beautiful ; that light which gives 
health to the soul, peace to the heart, and happiness 
to our troubled existence. 

What a comfort it is to remember that He who 
went about wearily and in sorrow doing good when one 
of us, now our Lord, can give sight to all humanity 
and sweet content to all of us who in the suicide of 
crime have already a foretaste of the hell hereafter. 
Cry out, oh ! sinner, as Christ passes, " Son of David, 
have mercy on me." 



118 Sunday Meditations, 



The hove of Children. 

"And they brought young children to Him, that 
He should touch them, and His disciples rebuked 
those that brought them. 

" But when Jesus saw it He was much displeased 
and said unto them, Suffer the little children to come 
unto Me and forbid them not, for of such is the 
kingdom of God. 

"Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not 
receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall 
not enter therein. 

"And He took them up in His arms, put his 
hands upon them and blessed them." 

There is probably no passage from the life of 
Christ more quoted and lovingly dwelt upon than 
this. Nor is this to be wondered at, for the event 
fetches our poor humanity so directly in contact 
with heaven. Our love of children is not only one 
of the strongest affections, but it is the purest. 

They who teach us the harmony and uniform 
beauty of what they are pleased to call the laws of 
nature find it difficult to fetch death in accord with 
their teaching. Sleep, life itself, with all its m}^s- 
teries, may be law, but death is violence. We strive 



The Love of Children. 119 

in vain to make it harmonize with any part of our 
being. Death and its attendant pain are in antag- 
onism to us, and mean war on nature. No teaching 
nor training, no attempt to look the inevitable in the 
face will make the dread thing familiar and less ter- 
rible. When one dies the world ends, and from that 
ending we shrink and cower, let our hearts be ever 
so brave, our faith ever so firm. We say they who 
are tortured by disease find relief in death. The 
heart-broken and sorely troubled find repose. Brave 
men and heroic women have calmly met his ap- 
proach, delicate girls have meekly folded their thin 
hands above their terror-stricken breasts, and babes 
have been folded in his arms with trembling little 
lips and wide-staring, terror-stricken eyes — but none, 
unless insane, have sought that refuge willingly. 
The inevitable in all else can be made familiar and 
met half way with endurance, but death never. 

" Why weepest thou ? " asked the philosopher 
of a sufferer, " thy tears are unavailing." 

" Therefore do I weep," was the touching re- 
sponse. 

But of all visits of this dread enemy the most 
terrible is when he comes to the household, as he 
comes to every household, to claim the little one 
whose cooing voice is the music of the heart, whose 



120 Sunday Meditations. 

little footsteps make the long hidden, silent affections 
of our inner being awaken to exquisite life. 

Where is the parent who has fought off his 
dread approaches through the long, anxious days 
and dreary watches of the sleepless nights, who has 
hung in breathless agony above the cradled bed and 
saw the loved form waste away and the poor life 
weaken, and thought of all the winning little ways— 
who has not been prostrated in prayer and begged 
hard and long of God to spare the breaking heart, this 
unendurable affliction, this great agony that seemed 
impossible for the mourner to survive? They tell us 
of the efficacy of prayer, that God hears and grants 
our petition when it is carried to Him on the wings 
of faith. Alas ! poor mother, the words go up in 
sobs from a broken heart like bubbles from a drown- 
ing man, and the little one dies all the same. 

Blind leaders of the blind. This misdirected 
doctrine has done more to rob the afflicted of relig- 
ion than all the teachings of science or the sneers of 
unbelief. The heart-broken stares in blind amaze- 
ment at the dead and cries in agony against the cruel, 
iron-heeled fate that in spite of prayer has crushed 
out a heart. ISTo ; prayer may cleanse the heart and 
purify the being, and like cries and groans, give re- 
lief after a time, but it turns not death away. Christ 
in the garden prayed in agony to be saved, and prayed 



The Love of Children. 121 

in vain. Who since then may have what was denied 
Him ? 

And when, in those fateful hours between mid- 
night and morn, when life's tide ebbs and the little 
breath becomes more feeble, and the tiny pulse slips 
away from all feeling, and at last the loved one is 
still, and the long preserved quiet of the house is 
broken with agonizing cries — a sorrow is burned into 
one that no time, no religious consolation can soften 
or erase. Years and years after the keen heartache 
will return as one looks through tears at a lock of 
sunny hair or an old, half-worn little shoe. One's 
earthly possession, one's real estate that is priceless, 
can never be sold or mortgaged or giveu away, is a 
little narrow grave. The dear form molders into 
dust and disappears, but it never leaves the heart; the 
babe is one's precious babe through life. Perhaps 
forever. 

Ah ! me, what comfort there is, what sweet con- 
solation to read these loving words " Suffer the little 
children to come unto Me and forbid them not, for 
of such is the kingdom of God." 

" And He took them up in His arms, put His 
hands upon them and blessed them." 

The afflicted says " He who has no children has 
taken my poor little one into His arms and put His 

11 



122 Sunday Meditations. 

tender, loving hands upon its head and blessed it. 
Peace, oh ! my heart. Christ lives." 

We might lose all of the blessed Testament but 
that one passage, and yet true Christianity could win 
and control the world. 

There is no love like unto that love. Said a 
profound jurist to us : 

" A mother's love survives the deepest degradation 
of which the female nature is capable, and it is capa- 
ble of a lower state than man's nature. When a 
woman comes into my court claiming the custody of 
her child I always grant it. She may be a bad wo- 
man and yet a good mother, at least the best if not 
the only mother the child can have. In this way I 
have at times saved both mother and child. For the 
sake of the child the mother will at least strive to 
appear virtuous. It is a rare event for a father and 
son to be engaged knowingly to each other in crime. 
It is never the case with mother and child." 

Given by God, they lure us to heaven. Fresh 
from the hands of their Creator, pure and sweet in 
their innocence, not contaminated by sinful life, they 
fall about us like flowers from Paradise. Such as 
they are is the kingdom of heaven. A wise man has 
told us that in our old age, when the frame weakens 
and the faculties decay, the mind returns to, first its 
early youth and then its childhood. We pass from 



The Love of Children. 123 

life as we entered, and the mother's teaching goes 
with ns to that other life. 

Deep and strong as the lesson of love is in the 
passage we quote, there is yet a more important one 
taught in the way of faith. When Christ says that 
such is the kingctom of heaven He means that con- 
fidence, that faith, that are such traits of childhood he- 
fore contact with earth hrings suspicion, disappoint- 
ment and all the ills that sad experience entails. 
This lesson is taught in nearly all the life of our 
Savior. What is learning hut doubt; what can 
science give us but disbelief? To reap the full bene- 
fit of all so beautifully given us by the Son of David 
we must approach Him with the faith of children, and 
confidingly take from His divine teaching the beau- 
tiful lessons of love in life, for such is the king- 
dom of God and the heaven promised us hereafter. 



124 Sunday Meditations. 



Respectable Christians. 

The attempt made to worship two masters, so 
strongly prohibited by our Savior, •ends in our giving 
nearly all to Caesar and very little to God. How 
strange it is, after the centuries of teaching, that in our 
striving to harmonize the worshiping of the two we 
should separate morality from religion. In Christ of 
course they mean one and the same thing. With us 
the line is drawn between the two, and both roads 
lead to heaven. The morality of modern Christian- 
ity means to be respectable. The world has come to 
be commercial, and if one meets promptly his moneyed 
obligations he is considered eminently fitted for 
heaven. He may fail in all else, and his failures will 
be considered eccentricities and indiscretions, not in- 
tefering in the least with his respectability or claim 
to Christian fellowship. The marble pulpit preaches 
to velvet-cushioned pews. It is not considered in 
good taste for the modern apostle to awaken respect- 
ability by unpleasant reference to the sins of to-day. 
Truths lose their meaning through frequent repeti- 
tion, and so the sins denounced over eighteen centuries 
since in Jerusalem have been repeated until they cease 
to irritate, and rather add to than awaken from the 



Respectable Christians. 125 

slumber of indifference. The respectable Christian 
of to-day may be a Jew in his dealings — so that he be 
a Hebrew in his devotions, it is well with him. 

We complimented a young divine on the devoted 
conduct of his congregation. 

" Yes," he responded, sadly, " the way in which 
my little congregation in the Lord sing, pray, exhort, 
and cheat each other is very refreshing." 

A delegation of pious colored men waited on 
their pastor one day, who had been making himself 
extremely disagreeable by denouncing theft, indo- 
lence, uncleanliness, adultery, and other sins. 

" Brudder Campbell," they petitioned, " can't you 
stop talking so much about stealin' and sich, and give 
us one day ob good ole-fashioned praise-de-Lord re- 
ligion? " 

The poor, benumbed intellect of a helpless race 
struck in a rough way the Caesarism of modern re- 
ligion. It is allowable for us to gain heaven through 
the prake-the-Lord devotion while nursing our sins, 
provided we pay our debts and so are respectable. 
The belief is general that there is a diplomatic gallery 
in heaven, where the rich and well-born, clad in pur- 
ple and fine linen, sing operatic music in front of a 
huge organ. Beautiful music must be acceptable to 
the Lord, for it is the one form of prayer that more 
surely lifts the soul from the business and degrada- 



126 Sunday Meditations. 

tion of sinful life ; but the hands that hold the harps 
must be clean, and the voices those of the pure and 
innocent to please God. 

We have often thought, in this religious Csesar- 
ism that exists to-day, of the consternation that 
would fall upon a congregation were Christ and His 
chosen twelve to walk into a fashionable church. 
Travel-stained, foot-weary, badly appareled as they 
were, how religious Csesarism would gather away its 
skirts and gaze in trouble at the very founders of their 
faith ! 

Ah ! how hard it is to realize that Christ was dis- 
owned, denounced, and crucified for that He was not 
respectable. The Jews were looking anxiously for 
their Messiah, who was to come in clouds of glory to 
slaughter and subdue their enemies, and lo ! He ap- 
peared an humble mechanic, born in a manger, teach- 
ing love and loving forgiveness. Poor human nature 
is the same to-day as it was in Jerusalem, and has 
been through the centuries. We persecute the Jews 
for doing only that whicb we practice to-day. What 
would be thought of the rich man to-day who would 
give all he possessed to the poor? His heirs, under 
the solemn sanction of a court, would consign him to 
an asylum for the insane ; and yet the terrible con- 
demnation of the rich man, written in unfading words 



Respectable Christians. 127 

above the portal of every palace on earth, remains to 
be read of all men. 

And so it has come to pass under our religious 
Ceesarism, that our worst men are our best Christians. 
The cold, calculating, selfish creature who carefully 
observes religious forms, who pays his debts, and is 
therefore respectable, walks in the ways of righteous- 
ness, although he may oppress the poor, crowd his 
debtor to the wall, torture his enemy, and live through 
life without one generous impulse. His charity is of 
an organized sort — a huge machine that grinds out 
alms to the worthy poor. He does not belong to the 
class of hypocrites denounced by Christ. The religion 
of the Jews was a terrible religion of vengeance, with 
a God made up of the worst qualities of humanity, 
that he might be feared and understood. But their 
religion was the ten commandments, and the sinner 
who prayed in public places was forced to a pretense 
that made him a hypocrite. But we have harmonized 
all that. Our sinner is not a hypocrite — he is one 
who deceives himself. Modern theology teaches him 
that Satan is the servant of God, and he has compro- 
mised with the enemy. The husks he lives on are 
the husks of corn husked out over eighteen hundred 
years since, and are therefore very dry and without 
nutrition. The walls of his temple are massive — too 



128 Sunday Meditations. 

thick to admit the groans of the oppressed, the cries 
of the poor, the wailings of despair. 

There is no more deadly enemy to true religion — 
the religion of Christ — than selfishness, and the es- 
sence of selfishness is the model Christian, who 
gathers in the good things of this world in one hand 
while he holds the beguiled cross in the other. 

" I have been looking in the trap that holds our 
little rogues, the weak fellows," said the late Chief 
Justice Chase, when governor of Ohio, after a visit 
to the penitentiary, " and now I will dine with the 
big rogues, and next Sunday we will all go to church 
and thank God that we are not as they are — in the 
penitentiary." 

How beautifully Christ tells us this in His parable 
of the prodigal son : 

"And He said, a certain man had two sons : 

"And the younger of them said to his father, 
Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to 
me. And he divided unto them his living. 

"And not many days after the younger son 
gathered all together, and took his journey into a far 
country, and there wasted his substance with riotous 
living. 

"And when he had spent all there arose a 
mighty famine in that land, and he began to be in 
want. 



Respectable Christians. 129 

"And he went and joined himself to a citizen 
of that country, and he sent him into his fields to 
feed swine. 

"And he would fain have filled his belly with 
the husks that the swine did eat; and no man gave 
unto him. 

"And when he came to himself he said, How 
many hired servants of my father's have bread 
enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! 

" I will arise and go to my father, and will say 
unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and 
before thee, 

"And am no more worthy to be called thy son ; 
make me as one of thy hired servants. 

"And he arose and came to his father. But 
when he was yet a great way off his father saw him 
and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck 
and kissed him. 

"And the son said unto him, Father, I have 
sinned against heaven and in thy sight, and am no 
more worthy to be called thy son. 

" But the father said to his servants, Bring forth 
the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on 
his hand and shoes on his feet. 

"And bring hither the fatted calf and kill it, and 
let us eat and be merry. 

" For this my son was dead, and is alive again ; 



130 Sunday Meditations. 

he was lost and is found. And they .began to be 
merry. 

"low bis elder son was in the field, and as he 
came and drew nigh to the house he heard music and 
dancing. 

"And he called one of the servants, and asked 
what these things meant. 

"And he said unto him, Thy brother is come, 
aud thy father hath killed the fatted calf, because he 
hath received him safe and sound. 

"And he was angry, and would not go in. There- 
fore came his father out and entreated him. 

"And he answering said to his father, Lo, these 
many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at 
any time thy commandment, and yet thou never 
gavest me a kid that I might make merry with my 
friends. 

" But as soon as this thy son was come, which 
hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast 
killed for him the fatted calf. 

"And he said unto him, son, thou art ever with 
me, and all that I have is thine. 

" It was meet that we should make merry and 
be glad ; for this the brother was dead, and is alive 
again, and was lost and is found." 

One of the lessons taught in the above parable is 
the subject of our meditations. The careful, pru- 



Respectable Christians. 131 

dent, selfish son, who saw his more repulsive brother 
depart without a sigh and noted his return with jeal- 
ous envy, is rebuked, as our excellent, respectable 
Christian will be when, standing naked before the 
gates of heaven, he asks to be rewarded for having 
cared for himself- 



132 Sunday Meditations. 



The first of Demosfats. 

There is one trait in the character of our Lord and 
Savior upon which it is great comfort to dwell, and 
that is his democracy. He was the first and last true 
democrat of all the ages. Others claiming to be 
such are only demagogues — shallow pretenders or 
charlatans, using their brain to perfect their acting. 
Or worse yet, they are men soured by failure and en- 
vious of others' success. But His nature was sweet, 
and while He denounced the sin He had room in His 
mighty heart for the repentant sinner. But looking 
through the rags He saw the man, and penetrating 
the robes He recognized the hypocrite. His brief, 
beautiful life was passed among the poor, the humble 
and the sinful. He was born in a manger and died 
between two thieves. He was the friend of the con- 
vict, the poor, weak creature crowded to the wall 
and trampled to the earth, and He was the consoler 
and companion of the poor laborer whose bent back, 
bowed head and hard hands told of a life-long strug- 
gle for life. He had but little time to be with us, and 
that little was given to those who had only their hu- 
manity to plead. He did not seek the learned nor the 
great of earth, nor the rich and well born, in the few 



The First of Democrats. 133 

years alotted to Him on earth. And has no one 
thought how significant is the fact that He, whose 
mission was of such vital importance to the human 
race, was with us as man so brief a period? One 
would think that He should have been immortal, liv- 
ing through the centuries, to repeat the teachings 
from His own eloquent lips unto all humanity. But 
that divine presence would have conquered for us. 
What would have been left for the endeavor, the 
grand struggle that purifies the heart and elevates 
our being until we are worthy, and being worthy are 
prepared for that heaven His divine goodness has pre- 
pared for us ? He led us through suffering ; He 
taught through example and He sealed His truths with 
His blood. Were He with us, a God in His immortal- 
ity, He would do our work ; or if not, we would be 
filled with despair at the thought of His perfection 
that we are ordered to attain. It was necessary that 
He should be man to convince us what man could ac- 
complish. 

We can not say that Christ lived only after His 
crucifixion, but we say that His doctrines took life 
from that dreadful event, and revelation was given 
only when the heaven opened in terror to receive the 
God rejected by humanity He sought so earnestly and 
lovingly to aid. There was a resurrection in that 
death few of us pause to consider. How that which 



134 Sunday Meditations. 

poor humanity supposes for the moment to end their 
annoyance sometimes dates its power. The cruel 
crowd that howled about our Savior in His last tor- 
ments, went to their homes believing the presump- 
tious Nazarene was ended. It was not that the veil 
of the temple was rent, and that the skies were dark- 
ened and the earth shook as in an agony that their 
crime became manifest, but that the beautiful truths 
He had uttered to the down-trodden and oppressed 
took new life, and of that dim and dreadful past 
come down to us clad in the mantel of immortality. 
Csesar dies in the opening of the tragedy by the mas- 
ter mind of men, but Csesars ghostly shadow holds 
the stage until all go down in a common ruin. The 
horror that comes upon us when we think of God 
being rejected in scorn and torture well nigh drowns 
out the sorrow His sad life and death should give us. 
He came among us as a man, to suffer the lot of such 
and die ; but how hard it is to reconcile ourselves to 
the insult that made His death so horrible, now that 
we know and knowing love and worship Him. 

It is necessary for us to keep this in mind. He 
was one of us. All that He did we can accomplish, 
or striving to accomplish, can make ourselves worthy 
of His love, help, and protection. Let us, then, con- 
template His character as it was in its humanity, and 
so contemplating, weigh well His utterances. In His 



The First of Democrats. 135 

earnest simplicity, in His true, sweet, loving endeavor 
to take humanity to His heart, what a democrat He 
was! There is no man who ever died for man, no 
patriot with swelling heart and eager protest of elo- 
quence, ever uttered more that was possessed of 
higher scorn for the oppressor than these few simple 
utterances : 

'' Then spake Jesus to the multitude, and to His 
disciples, 

" Saying, The scribes and the Pharisees sit in 
Moses' seat. 

"All therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, 
that observe and do ; but do not ye after their works; 
for they say and do not. 

" For they bind heavy burdens, and grievous to 
be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders ; but they 
themselves will not move them with one of their 
fingers. 

" But all their works they do for to be seen of 
men ; they make broad their phylacteries, and en- 
large the borders of their garments, 

"And love the uppermost rooms at feasts, and 
the chief seats in the synagogues, 

"And greetings in the markets, and to be called 
of men, Rabbi, Rabbi. 

"But be not ye called Rabbi: for one is your 
Master, even Christ; and all ye are brethren. 



136 Sunday Meditations. 

"And call no man your father upon the earth : 
for one is your Father, which is in heaven. 

" Neither be ye called masters : for one is your 
Master, even Christ, 

" But he that is greatest among you shall be 
your servant. 

"And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be 
abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be 
exalted." 

" Call no man your father upon earth," and call 
no man your master. The grand equality before 
God of all on earth here taught sweeps away two- 
thirds of earth's .idolatry. Where are your princes 
and potentates ; where the rulers who make broad 
their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their 
garments, and love the uppermost rooms at feasts, 
and the chief seats ? Miserable actors are they, 
who would be subjects of laughter as they are of 
scorn, but that they can torture and abuse in their 
" insolence of office." 

And we have immortalized the man who said to 
us that all men are born free; but Christ gives the 
words significance by adding, " and before God are 
born equal." On the broad platform of common suf- 
fering, coming helpless and naked into life, and going 
to one common bourne, the grave, we are all the 



The First of Democrats. 137 

children of God, and any distinction that creates an 
inequality is a sham and a mockery. 

Who that has stood in the low hovel that was 
once the home of Scotland's greatest poet and pa- 
triot, and looked over the fields where he toiled as a 
serf, does not hasten to pardon his sins that they may 
acknowledge his nobility? He had the sanction of 
our Savior in his heartfelt, earnest protest against 
oppression ; in his lofty scorn of rank, that held it- 
self above toiling, suffering humanity. 

And how strange it is that God's great work, 

claimed to be in His own image, should be held the 

least valuable of all our worldly possessions. Houses, 

lands, bonds, gold, satin-lined carriages and gayly 

caparisoned horses, all that pampers the body and 

deadens the soul, are rated above that for which all 

these things were made. And yet the little helpless 

being that came to us through a mother's agony adds 

nothing to that affection in such surroundings, which 

makes its life so precious. ISTor when the life, 

through tender nursing and loving care, gives to 

manhood all that moves the heart to joy or tears, 

and makes a being so near and dear that it can not 

be measured by money, it lives in itself, and has no 

gain from what the world rates so far above it. 

Genius that gave birth to great thought, patriotic 

impulse that lives through great deeds, come from 
12 



138 Sunday Meditations. 

lowly homes and cradles as obscure as the manger 
that held our Savior. And yet the world dwarfs 
God's work in deep mines, mows it down by thou- 
sands in great battles, and tramples it in scorn along 
the highways of life. The world crucified Christ, 
and it crowds down His humble followers. And yet, 
O Christian friends, in the purple and fine linen, 
there is a horrible disease silently at work under your 
gay apparel, and ere another Sunday's meditation 
meets the light your friends will hurry your well- 
clad yet loathsome body out of sight, and your naked 
soul will stand shivering before the bar of God, no 
better than the poor laborer you so despised in life. 

" For so the world goes, 

. And so the stream flows, 

But there 's an old fellow nobody knows, 

AVho setteth all free, 

On land and on sea, 

And maketh the rich like the poor to flee." 

And how grand the church is that through all 
the ages has taught and plead and obeyed, regarding 
God only as master, and opening her doors as her 
heart to all alike ! In that sanctuary that is God's 
temple all vain differences disappear, and the poor 
laborer, beside the proudest potentate, receives the 
same recognition, the same relief, the same salvation. 



Love for Oar Fellow-men. 139 



Love for Oar FellouMaen. 

" Give to every man that asketh of thee ; and of 
him that taketh away thy goods, ask them not again. 

"And as ye would that men should do to you, 
do ye also to them likewise. 

" For if ye love them which love you, what 
thank have ye ? for sinners also love those that love 
them. 

"And if ye do good to them which do good to 
you, what thank have ye ? for sinners also do even 
the same. 

"And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to 
receive, what thank have ye ? for sinners also lend 
to sinners, to receive as much again. 

"But love ye your enemies, and do good, and 
lend, hoping for nothing again ; and your reward shall 
be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest; 
for He is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. 

" Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also 
is merciful. 

"Judge not, and ye shall not be judged; con- 
demn not, and ye shall not be condemned; forgive, 
and ye shall be forgiven. 

"Give, and it shall be given unto you; good 



140 Sunday Meditations. 

measure, pressed down and shaken together, and 
running over, shall men give into your bosom. For 
with the same measure that ye mete withal, it shall 
be measured to you again. 

"And He spake a parable unto them, Can the 
blind lead the blind? shall they not both fall into 
the ditch?" 

v The selfishness of accepted religion is a strange 
fact, when contrasted with the sacrifice of self, taught 
by our divine master. Without the pronoun " I " 
religion were not possible to the great mass of civil- 
ized humanity. With such to save one's soul makes 
up the sum of all effort. Such Christian egotists do 
not reflect, that to have salvation acceptable we must 
live in the hereafter with our identity the same as on 
earth. There is as little comfort as philosophy in 
the popular translation to passionless bodies, cold, 
white robes, and everlasting harpings before the 
throne of God. Who contemplates death with cour- 
age from whose heavy heart has been taken the hope 
of looking again on the dear face of one's mother or 
father, with all the homely lines of the careworn but 
loving face ? Or, who hopes for a heaven where one 
could not clasp the lost little one or the loving wife? 
Where is the mother who would not die to save her 
child, or be damned to insure its eternal felicity ? 



Love for Our Fellow-men. 141 

This is religion — the religion that made our Christ 
suffer torture and indignity that we might live. 

What were heaven to the selfish, or the mean 
and avaricious ? 

" Oh ! my wife ! " cried an enthusiast, " a million 
of years will pass in looking upon my loved Savior's 
face before I shall want to see yours, so much greater 
is my love of my Redeemer than my love of earthly 
things." 

And we have heard the above repeated, by min- 
isters of the gospel, in illustration of what should be 
our devotion to God. Blind leaders of the blind. 
The earthly love thus discarded as a feverish, un- 
healthy desire for the not only unattainable but the 
undesirable, is the very foundation of heaven itself. 
We turn insanely from all that Christ taught, lived, 
suffered and died for. 

There are earthly ties that stretch from life into 
eternity, and hold us to a hope of a heaven that 
would not be a heaven without them. Who would 
leave even this green, sunny earth for the cold, 
golden streets that Christ, speaking in parable to a 
money-getting people, sought to picture as attractive 
that which eye had not seen, nor ear heard, nor the 
mind of man conceived. We long for that which 
God has made so precious and Christ has prom- 
ised us. 



142 Sunday Meditations. 

Said a home missionary in the city of New York, 
" I ministered to a poor widow woman who was dying 
in a tenement house, of a disease that had long been 
regarded as incurable. She had become known to 
the police through her devotion to her evil children. 
Scarcely a term of court passed that one or the other 
was not arraigned for some grave offense. She was a 
hard-working, honest woman, and her clinging so 
faithfully to the miserable family won for her the 
respect, if not the admiration of the police. There- 
fore, when she begged to see her children before she 
died, I had one son brought from the penitentiary — a 
hardened villain; he was sentenced to ten years for 
burglary. The other son we brought in from the gut- 
ter, and the daughter from a worse locality. That dy- 
ing scene was so pitiful that it made the heart ache. 
There was the poverty-stricken appearance of the 
apartment, that is always the more obtrusive when 
an effort is made at cleanliness and order. The poor 
woman looked from her pale, thin face and hollow 
eyes upon these children who had given her so much 
pain, but love survived all. She stretched out her 
skeleton arms and moaned piteously, like a dying an- 
imal. I have known a cow to moan that way after 
her young. She placed her thin hands upon their 
heads — -on the close-shaven head of the convict—as 
if she were blessing them. I prayed long and earn- 



Love for Our Fellow-men. 143 

estly for them all, and then I strove to administer to 
her the consolations of religion. I told her that her 
weary strife would soon be at an end, and her dear 
Savior would say, ' Well done thou good and faith- 
ful servant ; enter into the Kingdom prepared for you.' 
Her dying eyes were on her children ; every gasp of 
breath was a pain and a moan. At last she gasped, 
'Don't ask my salvation — I don't want it — I don't 
want to be parted from my children — let me go with 
them. God never heard my prayer before to save 
them — let him hear this.' 

"And so she died. I shall never forget that night 
if I live a thousand years. It was bitter cold and 
storming, and the frost seemed to hurry to claim its 
own, the corpse, in through the crevices, and holes, 
and rattling windows ; but it was not so cold as the 
stony hearts of those sons and daughter. The con- 
vict asked with an oath if we were done with him ; 
the inebriate begged for money to procure whisky, 
while the daughter's lamentations were worse than 
their indifference ; but the mother's love lived through 
their degradation, and went with her to where that 
love and devotion made the wings of an angel." 

It is a lamentable error we have taught ourselves 
that Christ's words, and, above all, Christ's unselfish 
example, are addressed to the individual, and that we 
can separate from the human family, and each one 



144 Sunday Meditations. 

steal selfishly into heaven. For such there is no 
heaven — for heaven means happiness, and there is no 
happiness here or hereafter for the mean and sordid. 
So long as the memory of Mount Calvary and its 
cross remains to the human race, with their sublime 
example of Christ dying for humanity, the beauty, 
purity, and virtue of self-sacrifice will beam in eternal 
light of God before us. 

We may well differ as to the sanity of Old Ossa- 
wattomie Brown, and shudder at the thought of the 
servile insurrection he planned, and yet no one can 
contemplate that old man, who wrote the emancipa- 
tion proclamation upon the mountains of Virginia 
long before Abraham Lincoln dreamed of it, as he 
stood, a hero, manacled and hurt, amid his fierce en- 
emies, and not feel a thrill of admiration as he said 
so simply, and yet with such moving eloquence, " Had 
1 done this thing for my own race, you would have 
praised it as right, but being done for the negro, it is 
a crime." At least he was brave, sincere, and self- 
sacrificing. Are there other qualities necessary to 
lift a motive, however mistaken the intent, into ad- 
miration ? These few simple words, after all, struck 
the manacles from the limbs of four millions of slaves, 
and all that followed is vulgar ambition, of the earth, 
earthy, in comparison. 

To love God, we must love our fellow-men. To 



Love for Our Fellow-men. 145 

follow Christ into that heaven His death prepared for 
us, we must be ready and willing to die for others. 
Good will to man on earth precedes and makes possi- 
ble the glory to God in the highest, and may the 
example of Our Savior soften our hearts towards 
each other as His great heart forgives us our 
transgressions. 



13 



146 Sunday Meditations. 



tinjast Steaiafds. 

"And He said also unto His disciples, There was 
a certain rich man which had a steward ; and the 
same was accused unto him that he had wasted his 
goods. 

"And he called him, and said unto him, How is 
it that I hear this of thee ? Give an account of thy 
stewardship ; for thou mayest be no longer steward. 

" Then the steward ' said within himself, What 
shall I do ? for my Lord taketh away from me the 
stewardship ; I can not dig ; to beg I am ashamed. 

" I am resolved what to do, that, when I am put 
out of the stewardship, they may receive me into 
their houses. 

" So he called every one of his Lord's debtors 
unto him, and said unto the first, How much owest 
thou unto my Lord ? 

"And he said, A hundred measures of oil. And 
he said unto him, Take thy bill, and sit down quickly, 
and write fifty. 

" Then said he to another, And how much owest 
thou? And he said a hundred measures of wheat. 
And he said unto him, Take thy bill, and write four 
score. 



Unjust Stewards. 147 

"And the Lord commended the unjust steward, 
because he had done wisely; for the children of this 
world are in their generation wiser than the children 
of light. 

" And I say unto you, Make to yourselves friends 
of the mammon of righteousness ; that, when ye fail 
they may receive you into everlasting habitations. 

" He that is faithful in that which is least, is 
faithful also in much, and he that is unjust in the 
least, is unjust also in much. 

" If therefore ye have not been faithful in the un- 
righteous mammon, who will commit to your trust the 
true riches ? 

" And if ye have not been faithful in that which 
is another man's, who shall give you that which is 
your own ? 

"No servant, can serve two masters; for either 
he will hate the one and love the other, or else he 
will hold to the one and despise the other. Ye can 
not serve God and mammon." 

The teachings of our Savior are mainly devoted 
to the duty one owes himself and the duty we owe 
to others. The principal object of His mission seemed 
to be the purification and harmonizing of our life 
hereafter, of which he says but little. And while 
that little is vague in outline and wanting altogether 



148 Sunday Meditations. 

in detail, the rules of conduct on earth are clear, pos- 
itive, and incisive. 

Since His appearance on earth, instead of at- 
tempting to accommodate our lives to His teachings, 
we have striven with much ingenuity to make His 
teachings in accord with our worldly life. 

To accomplish this the more easily, we slur over, 
as of secondary importance, the Christian law of life 
on earth, to build a religion on life hereafter. As we 
can not be as perfect as our blessed Savior, we will 
reserve our efforts until such time hereafter when, 
divested of the passions, sickness, and weakness of the 
flesh, we can strive better in the spirit. In this way, 
as we have tried to show, religion has come to be 
something apart and different from our real life here, 
and pertains to the hereafter. Therefore we can 
readily render unto Caesar things which are Caesar's, 
occupying all of six days of the week, and unto God 
the things which are God's on the seventh. 

Therefore is it that we can be hard on Christ's 
friends and associates, the poor — crowd them down 
with insult to starvation, abuse them for daring to 
complain, and then go to church on Sunday and listen 
to Hebrew sins nearly nineteen hundred years of age, 
preached from a marble pulpit, while we dream, in a 
velvet cushioned pew, of a heaven where the rich 
and well-born, the educated and refined, meet in ever- 



Unjust Stewards. 149 

lasting praise before the throne of God. " Give us 
this day our daily bread," beats unmeaningly on the 
ears of those who have robbed thousands of their 
food. Through the thick solid walls of the temple 
no whisper of the world's misery reaches in to dis- 
turb the harmony of a religion Christ came to de- 
stroy, or to waken the self-satisfied from dreams of 
a heaven that is impossible. We reason to ourselves 
the imitations of Christ until that solemn time when 
corruption shall put on incorruption, and the ethere- 
alized being in robes of light shall be lifted above the 
temptations of the flesh. In the meantime we are 
clad m corruption and to corruption we give the best 
of our time. We have accomplished what Christ did 
not even attempt, but told us was impossible. We 
have harmonized Caesar and God. We serve with 
philosophical indifference the two masters. 

How little in all the centuries has humanity 
changed ! We are suffering to-day from the unjust 
stewards. With a land teeming in plenty, we have 
from every part cries of want. For years past it has 
been a demand for work. Now it deepens into an 
agonizing cry for bread. " Give us this day our daily 
bread," cry the half starved from the naked hillsides. 
" Give us this day our daily bread," repeat the un- 
just, full-stomached stewards in their cushioned pews 
and fine linen, while the deep-toned organ and mel- 



150 Sunday Meditations. 

low voices send up praise to God in the highest, with- 
out good will to men on earth. 

It is rendering unto Csesar things which are 
Caesar's for the unjust steward who has stolen from 
the poor to defend his stealings by force. We 
rob and then we murder, if the victim complains. 
This is law and order. Christ has said to the faith- 
ful, if a demand is made for the cloak one must give 
the coat also. But Caesar says that if the laborer, 
who is worthy of his wages, makes complaint that 
he gets no wages, and is noisy and disagreeable, give 
him the bayonet instead of the bread, for society, 
that rises above Christ, and is based on law and order, 
must be preserved. 

To-day the land is filled to overflowing with 
abundance. Granaries are full of the golden corn, 
the nutritious wheat ; the fatted cattle cover the plains 
and hills, and yet millions are starving, out of em- 
ploy, while the millions at work are weak from lack 
of sufficient food. And why is this? Because the 
unjust stewards come, between the labor and its just 
reward. The unjust stewards, worse than locusts, 
have consumed all of the substance of the land in 
their riotous living. 

There is but one thing left that is sacred in the 
eyes of Csesar, and that is debt. And our country 
is the debtor, and it is the law that it shall be held 



Unjust Stewards, 151 

by the throat until the last cent is secured. Pay 
what thou owest and pay it quickly, interest and 
capital, in gold. What matters it that labor starves, 
the Shylocks must have the coin or the flesh, and 
possibly both. 

This is hard when the debt is justly owing, but 
it is something beyond the endurance of flesh and 
blood when the unjust stewards have forced on us 
unjust debts. We may submit in silence to the pres- 
ence of men who, in just dealings, have accumulated 
riches through economy and shrewdness, however 
hard and tyrannical they may be; but armed resist- 
ance to the wicked oppressor is the law of God. We 
submit to the processes of law in the punishment 
of crime, that the innocent may not be made to suf- 
fer; but law or no law, crime is to be punished. It 
is well that society be protected and preserved,' but 
the man and the family antedates the social organi- 
zation, and when the law fails to accomplish evenly 
what the law was created to do, society is resolved 
into its original element, where each man is a law 
unto himself. 

It was never ordained, and can not be endured, 
that one man should hold another in slavery, w T hite 
or black, and when through any combination of cir- 
cumstances this happens, the social structure has lost 



152 Sunday Meditations. 

its significance, and is no longer, in the eyes of God 
or man, worth the preservation. 

"Resistance to tyranny is a service to God," 
said the patriot of old, who marched proudly to the 
scaffold to die for men. Seen through the softening 
haze of a hundred years, the grand truth rises in 
grandeur as distant mountains, in assuming the hue 
of heaven, become a part of heaven. It is in the 
vexed present that we are confused. The poor la- 
borer, ridden over and crushed by the Juggernaut 
of a heartless corporation, lacks something of the 
heroic in his hollow cheeks and ragged clothes. He, 
too shot down in the streets, serves his God and dies 
for his fellow-men. Will time soften into beauty the 
sad event, or only cover it in the darkness of oblivion ? 
Christ, who died at the hands of a mob, had no bay- 
onets at His back to enforce law and order. Would 
He have used them had they been available? Fool, 
Christ was crucified in the name of law and order. 
He was the rioter, with His twelve tent-makers and 
fishermen, and that great commercial center, Jerusa- 
lem, solemnly adjudged Him death lest He endanger 
the social and political structure of their day. 

Violence is of no avail save in self-defense. It 
is the law of the sword that he who lives by it shall 
die by it. It carries death in its scabbard and death 
in its hilt. The government that can not sustain 



Unjust Stewards. 153 

itself save on the bayonet ceases to be for the com- 
mon good. It is only the instrument of the unjust 
steward. 

Every man is an unjust steward who wrongs in 
any way his fellow-men. In this God made stewards 
of us all, and He is the master to whom we must ren- 
der our accounts. And who among us, when we 
look into ourself before asking the help of God, can 
say, "this day I have wronged no man?" And 
what a mockery is the prayer if one has been the 
unjust steward, and seeks to deceive God as he de- 
ceives himself and his fellow-men. It is not that we 
have been charitable, patient, kind, and forgiving, 
but have we been just? and not being just, what is 
there left upon which to base divine mercy ? 

Ah ! fools, what are the few years of troubled 
wealth, with their anxieties and hearts filled with 
anguish of hidden wrong, to the peaceful content 
Christ's teachings and example give to the lost oppor- 
tunity that made earth a foretaste of heaven, and 
heaven a continuation of all that was good and 
happy on earth ? 



154 Sunday Meditations, 



"Son, Gfre ffle Thy Heart." 

One can not dwell long upon the memory of our 
Savior's life on earth without finding that it is our 
feeling, more than our judgment, through which we 
are contemplating His acts and character. And after 
all, this is our better guide through life. We owe so 
little to reason and so much to affection. On this 
last is based the household. On this we build up 
the home ; and to test its importance, let any one ask 
himself how much there is outside worth contending 
for. The walls of one's home are the boundary of 
one's happiness. All else is cold and comfortless, 
vain hopes and cruel disappointments. The dove re- 
turned to the ark, but the raven did not return. All 
that is gentle and of Christ in us finds its better de- 
velopment in the household. 

This is not only the teaching of Christ, but the 
law of our being. We share it in common with the 
beasts. Among the animals the fiercest become 
gentle, the stupid intelligent, the most timid grow 
brave in the care and defense of the young. Who 
has not seen the poor little bird pretending to be hurt 
and helpless, that it may turn one from its nest, by 
an appeal to all that is cruel in our nature? Cod 



"Son, Give Me Thy Heart." 155 

help us, that is the way in which we are adjudged 
by all animated nature with which we are brought 
in contact. And we must not deceive ourselves with 
the belief that this instinct is dull and indiscriminate. 
There is a subtle intelligence therein that is unerring. 
Beware of the man shunned by children and dogs ; 
also the human being who can not laugh and has no 
sense of music. Such are human only in form ; the 
beast of prey lurks within. We know a cemetery 
beautifully adorned with woods and ponds. The su- 
perintendent, a man of rare qualities, enforces with 
care the law that prohibits killing within its limits, 
and its woods and ponds are frequented by wild ani- 
mals that cease to be wild, by strange birds, shy 
water-fowls that elsewhere find refuge from their 
great enemy, man, in barren wastes and wide, un- 
frequented marshes of distant seas; yet here they 
regard the throng of humanity with tame indiffer- 
ence. What subtle intelligence, as mysterious as the 
telegraph, has spread over the continent, telling these 
innocent, inoffensive creatures that there is one spot 
devoted to the dead, where the spirit of Christ lives, 
where His law of kindness prevails? The sparrow 
may fall to the ground, but the pair is not sold in 
the market for a price. 

Christ, looking through the cruel evil of our 
nature, saw the divine possibility beneath, and sought 



156 Sunday Meditations. 

in the feelings to develop all that is divine and beau- 
tiful of our being. As life is so brief, this labor 
would be without motive almost, but for the fact that 
it fits us for the heaven hereafter. It is the error of 
the day, as it has been the error of all time, that the 
development of the intellect alone elevates our na- 
ture and brings us closer to the divinity ; and yet the 
end of our knowledge is that we know nothing. 
We climb with pain and labor to the outer edge of 
our existence, and gaze over into the blank, deadly, 
unanswering space of eternity. Christ came as a 
parent to his children, to teach us kindness, charity, 
forgiveness one unto the other, and not as a philoso- 
pher, giving us facts and the reason for them ; for 
while there is divinity in our hearts there is nothing 
godlike in our intellect. He could not have made us 
comprehend the blade of grass plucked from the 
field ; and could He have done so, we would have 
been no nearer heaven than we are in our ignorance. 
It is in this error that we wrong ourselves and 
our children. We no longer train the young in the 
ways of moral conduct. We teach them science, in- 
struct them in art and are amazed to find that they 
are not virtuous. The most civilized in this process 
is the most wicked. One of our profoundest thinkers 
has said that he could not comprehend why a knowl- 
edge of arithmetic should be followed by a love of 



"Son, Give Me Thy Heart." 157 

truth, justice, and honest dealing. It was a shrewd 
parent that asked of a leading university what the 
extra charge would be, aside from the academic course 
of boating and boxing, to have his son taught to write 
and speak grammatically. It would be a wiser parent 
who would offer to pay large sums of money to have 
his child instructed in the ways of Christ, which mean 
the self-sacrifice found in self-restraint and a develop- 
ment of our kindlier nature. The day is not dis- 
tant when our much-vaunted common-school system, 
wherein labor is whimsically taxed — for labor pays 
all — to secure free schooling to the rich — will be re- 
garded as an evil. The fathers based our government 
wisely upon the virtue and intelligence of the citizen. 
We believe in the intelligence only. We educate to 
keep our children out of the penitentiary, through 
their superior shrewdness, and we can not see that our 
civil-service is bad, because all service is rotten. We 
laugh at the fabled story of the boy Washington say- 
ing to his father that he could not tell a lie, because 
the precocious wisdom that dictated such a heroic 
speech would have impelled the embryo patriot to 
have uttered a volume of lies. 

"All healthy children," said a cynic — which means 
one who not only sees evil as it is, but is fond of seeing 
it — " are born cowards, liars, and thieves." Of course, 
for they are born weak and helpless. With developed 



158 Sunday Meditations. 

strength comes the courage that resents a wrong, and 
then again the higher courage that can forgive it. 
And because of this weak, helpless condition, that 
developes, if left to itself, all that is selfish in our na- 
ture, we are said to be conceived in sin and brought 
forth in iniquity, and the doctrine of total depravity 
is taught. It is said of little children that Christ 
opened His arms to and bade them come to Him. 
The germ of all goodness is there, much nearer purity 
than at any time subsequent in life, for weak helpless- 
ness has its sweet, confiding nature where it finds pro- 
tection, and that, too, through the feelings rather than 
the intellect. Each parent realizes this, although so 
few are found capable of profiting by it. 

The religion of the intellect is sunlight on ice. 
It blinds one, while it chills the heart. 

We knew an able and learned man who took de- 
light in listening to the Rev. M. D. Conway. This 
reverend gentleman is a brilliant man. He takes 
Christ from the cross every Sunday to dissect the 
body and demonstrate the absurdity of superstition. 
His sermons are intellectual gymnastics, and yet as 
near true Christianity and the wants of our spiritual 
nature as sky-rockets get near the stars. We admire 
such sky-rockets, not because they go so high, but for 
that we are so low. Conway's learned parishioner had 
a child sicken and die. He saw his poor little boy nestle 



"Son, Give Me Thy Heart." 159 

in the arms of death, and his heart ached with unut- 
terable agony. Groping blindly for relief, he sent for 
an earnest, humble clergyman, a good man, only to 
pray with him over the body of his child. He learned 
through this sad experience that one drew nearer to 
God through the heart than through the intellect. 
Death taught him to fear God, love Christ and be con- 
tent in knowing nothing. What was it to him that 
he could weigh the sun, measure vast space, count ac- 
curately the age of the world, and know that light- 
ning carried our messages and steam did our work? 
He would have given all he knew and all he possessed 
to have one little throb from the heart stilled in death, 
or for one breath to the dear lips that never, never 
again would utter that music of love that is the life 
of the parent. 

Christ's precepts were few and precious, but His 
examples were many and His love boundless. One 
can not open upon any page of His record without 
finding the appeal to our better feelings, to our nobler 
nature. We have read the story of the poor woman 
who was miraculously restored to health by touch- 
ing with faith the garments of our Divine Master. 
With what simplicity the story is told : 

" And a certain woman, which had an issue of 
blood twelve years, 

" And had suffered many things of many phy- 



160 Sunday Meditations. 

sicians, and had spent all that she had, and was 
nothing bettered, but rather grew worse, 

" When she had heard of Jesus, came in the 
press behind and touched His garment, 

" For she said if I may touch but His clothes I 
shall be whole. 

" And straightway the fountain of her blood was 
dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed 
of that plague. 

" And Jesus, immediately knowing in Himself 
that virtue had gone out of him, turned Him about 
in the press and said, Who touched My clothes? 

"And His disciples said unto Him, Thou seest 
the multitude thronging Thee, and sayest Thou, Who 
touched me ? 

" And He looked round about to see her that had 
done this thing. 

" But the woman, fearing and trembling, know- 
ing what was done in her, came and fell down before 
Him, and told Him all the truth. 

" And He said unto her. Daughter, thy faith has 
made the whole; go in peace, and be whole of thy 
plague." 

In every instance of a miracle wrought there is 
not only the story told illustrating the power of God, 
but there is a subtle and almost hidden meaning to 
be drawn from it by the thoughtful believer. In the 



Son, Give Me Thy Heart. 161 

above we are called to note Him surrounded by the 
multitude. Many touched Him in the crowd, but it 
was only the poor, suffering woman who stole up to 
Him in a pitiful way and touched His garment with 
that faith that makes and marks the Christian, and 
she alone of the multitude, who had a reward. How 
many of earth's children crowd about our Savior, 
and how few touch His garment with that faith which 
gives us health. And the bloody issue that now fills 
our land with starvation and violence, finds so few 
willing to seek the remedy that comes through a be- 
lief in Him or His teachings of even-handed justice, 
kindness, charity, mercy and forgiveness. "With our 
hands at each other's throats, we seem to have for- 
gotteu our duty to each other and our hope of heaven 
hereafter. 



14 



r- 



162 Sunday Meditations. 



The (flondefs of Hatwe. 

We have been communing with nature — nature 
that leads us up to nature's God. We have been for 
days and nights a denizen of the wide, sunny fields, 
the willow-fringed brooks, the deep, solemn woods. 
We have looked upon those stars of earth, the wild 
flowers that grow in beauty and sweet perfume and 
boundless profusion, with no other "hand to plant, 
guard and train but God's. We have listened to the 
song of wild birds, that in their melody defy human 
imitation And we have said : " These are for us." 
And yet, in all the years of absence > since early 
youth, the trees have whispered, the brook has bab- 
bled, the flowers have bloomed, and the birds sang. 
When we shall have passed away, to be forgotten by 
men, these delicate, beautiful things will live on as if 
we had never existed. 

This is an old, old thought, and yet, in our selfish 
egotism, never to be realized. For us the sun rises 
in its dewy freshness of morn and sets in its golden 
garniture of clouds. To us the moon and stars make 
the night beautiful in its calm sublimity. The flow- 
ers bloom and the birds sing for us, wonderful, 
precious creatures that we are. 



The Wonders of Nature. 163 

And who returns, as we returned, to the scenes 

of childhood, to find how life has continued without 

change in our absence, but is forced to repeat with the 

poet — 

" I will not say my eyes are dim, 

I will not sing the change 
That 's wrought upon my soul within ; 

Its sadness, still and strange, 
Nor here, by flower and tree and stream, 

Repeat the well-worn lay, 
How we the fleeting shadows seem, 

Immortal substance they." 

Who goes from the desolated home, where death 
has left a black midnight of despair brooding by the 
hearthstone, bereft of all that makes life endurable, 
to find the sun shining upon that outer world of life, 
and not feel, after all our self-laudation, that we are 
but part, a sad, insignificant part, of this creation, 
that goes on and on, through all the ages, without 
us, and utterly indifferent to our existence? 

Who under the dark shadow but remembers the 
sad plaint of the Scottish poet, when, from death in the 
hovel of all that was fair and dear to him, he sang : 

" Ye banks and braes o 7 bonnie Doon, 
How can ye bloom so fresh and fair; 
How can ye chant, ye little birds, 
And I sae weary, fu' o' care ?" 



164 Sunday Meditations. 

Little reck they, in their joyous existence, of the 
broken heart that makes its despairing plaint in their 
sunny presence. 

It is in time only that the balm sweet nature 
holds works its cure and aids to heal our wounds. 
How pleasant it is to have one's life wedded, as it 
were, to these sweet, innocent things ; to have one's 
memory mingled with all that is beautiful of earth ; 
to go back in recollection to the long, wintry nights, 
when the mysterious winds moaned about one's dwell- 
ing, or when the silent snow whitened up the window- 
sill like the dead face of a forgotten friend ; or when 
one, in the deep, somber woods of June, saw the sun- 
light sifted through the wind-shifted leaves, when the 
whisperings seem those of forms long since moldered 
to dust in neglected graves. 

And how sweet it is to return, after years of ab- 
sence, and find the stately trees one planted offering 
a friendly shade to welcome the tired denizen of a 
peopled earth, to greet and be greeted by the humble 
animals we may have forgotten, but have not forgot- 
ten us. Those shrubs and trees we planted and 
trained, these animals we cared for, have no ingrati- 
tude. They do not repay our love with the unkind- 
ness of our fellow-men ; and the very ills of the 
rough life seem small by the side of those that have, 



The Wonders of Nature. 165 

making our hearts ache, turned us to bitterness and 
wrath. 

" Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky; 
Thou dost not bite so nigh 

As benefits forgot ; 
Though thou the waters warp 
Thy sting is not so sharp 

As friends remembering not." 

Alas ! this is not the only lesson taught us by 
the country. We enter upon the scene, and how 
sweetly harmonious and peaceful it all appears. From 
the deep green meadows, the fields of waving grain 
and rustling corn, through the purple noon's trans- 
parent light to the distant, softly rounded, wooded 
hills, that seem to melt into heaven's blue, all seem 
one grand harmonious whole. But we look closer. 
In this quiet stream is the murderous pike, living 
upon the more helpless fish. Above sits the keen- 
eyed, lightning-like king fisher. And yet above the 
wild hawk, like a censor, swung circles in heaven's 
blue, with cruel beak, watching for its prey. And in 
the still watches of the moonless nights the owl, on 
the downy wings of death, unseen, all seeing, floats 
noiselessly by, the assassin of the gloomy woods. The 
wild beasts have fled before the approach of man, but 
sin, cruelty and sorrow remain, feeding on all things 
fair. 



166 Sunday Meditations. 

Ah ! God, what are these mighty ills, pain and 
sin and death, that hold their own in the presence of 
their Creator, marring all his works ? Christ, "building 
his church, said the gates of hell should not prevail 
against it. "What are these gates of hell that they 
should contend with their Creator ? 

Give us the science that will solve this dread 
question. Find us the student, the learned man, who 
can lift from our souls this terrible doubt, and we 
will carry our gods to the temple of human learning 
and abandon all other hope of salvation. 

All about us is mystery. The blade of grass, the 
little insect with its golden coat and gauzy wings, 
whose delicate mechanism fills us with admiration, 
that seems to be tossed out upon boundless creation 
without care ; the delicate flower ; the tiny weeds 
about our feet- — all cease to be wonders only in being 
common. But the mysteries of all mystery are pain 
and death. These hideous phantoms loom up, black 
and dense, between our terror stricken sight and God. 
Prom them we turn to our loved Savior, who, pass- 
ing through both, returns to say : I am the resur- 
rection and the life. In charity I came to you ; in 
love I return. Poor, helpless children of men, wan- 
dering and groping in blind despair, listen to the Son 
of David, for He speaks from beyond the grave, where 
death is not ; where pain is not. 



Avarice and Hypocrisy. 167 



Rtfhvm and Jtypoerisy. 

"Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypo- 
crites ! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cum- 
min, and have omitted the weightier matters of the 
law, judgment, mercy and faith : these ought ye to 
have done, and not to leave the other undone. 

" Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat and 
swallow a camel. 

" Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypo- 
crites ! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and 
of the platter, *but within they are full of extortion 
and excess. 

" Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is 
within the^cup and platter, that the outside of them 
may be clean also. 

" Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypo- 
crites ! for ye are like unto whited sepulchers, which 
indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full 
of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness. 

" Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous 
unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and 
iniquity. 

"Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypo- 



168 Sunday Meditations. 

crites ! because ye build the tombs of the prophets, 
and garnish the sepulchers of the righteous." 

To one who studies with loving care the life and 
teachings of our Savior, there is surprise at first that, 
while the more atrocious crimes are merely referred 
to, the heaviest denunciations are bestowed upon 
money-getting and hypocrisy. A better knowledge 
of human nature teaches us, however, that our Lord 
knows us better than we know ourselves. The 
atrocious crimes of murder, cruelty, arson, robbery, 
and all that are born of violence, are unnatural and 
exceptional. They are more in the way of disease, 
and humanity, from a sense of self-preservation, 
guards against them without divine admonition. 
From all ages, in all climes and conditions, we find 
the criminal code reading nearly the same. How 
much soever we may differ on other subjects, this re- 
ceives the same treatment. The man of violence is 
treated the same as the wild beast possessed of appe- 
tites dangerous to life and destructive of peaceful 
security. 

And how much of this is disease no one can tell. 
Scientists of late years profess an ability to distin- 
guish the skull of a murderer from that of ordinary 
heads. A learned superintendent of an asylum for 
the insane called our attention to the fact that dis- 
ease or malformation lies probably at the base of 



Avarice and Hypocrisy. 169 

much that we call crime. He had a lad of twelve 
years of age brought to him for treatment. The boy, 
up to a certain late period, was affectionate and 
obedient. From this he changed to a condition of 
great irritability, that increased until he became dan- 
gerous, having attempted the life of his mother. It 
became necessary to confine him in an asylum. The 
doctor made a study of his little patient. He found 
on shaving his head a place where the heat indicated 
inflammation, and on further investigation discov- 
ered a fracture, with the bone pressing upon the 
brain. A surgical operation lifted this indentation, 
and the poor lad returned to his normal, quiet, 
affectionate disposition and conduct. 

How terrible the thought that in our cruel pur- 
suit and punishment of criminals we are hunting 
down sick and insane people. 

To say a word in their behalf is to incur the 
charge of mawkish sentimentalism. How the money- 
getting hypocrites of to-day would sneer at our Sa- 
vior, who promised the heaven to the thief writhing 
in agony upon the cross that He denied to those re- 
spectable matter-of-fact people who pride themselves 
upon being free of sentiment ! Ah, friends of Mam- 
mon, there is little in this world worth struggling for 
that can not be stigmatized in this way. What is 
the love of parent and child, all that makes the 
15 



170 Sunday Meditations. 

household dear and holy; what is patriotism itself, 
that lofty virtue praised through all ages hy orators 
and sung of hy poets, hut sentiment ? Who has seen 
a people rise in their wrath to lay waste and kill for 
the honor of our flag, and not wondered ? for the flag 
is a painted rag and their emotion nothing hut senti- 
ment. 

When we have passed from this brief existence 
of morality to the life hereafter, we shall find Heav- 
en's foundations based on the feeling we have been 
taught to despise, and Howard, who went through 
loathsome prisons striving to mitigate the sufferings 
of criminals, sitting on the right hand of the God 
who on earth made the poor and wicked His friends 
and associates. 

Christ warned us against that which is a part of 
our normal condition — our poor human nature — that, 
if left unrestrained, will inevitably degrade us to a 
condition where the more horrible offenses are possi- 
ble. From the selfishness of money-getting comes 
the desire to do wrong ; from the necessity of a pro- 
cess through which wrong may be done with impunity, 
comes hypocrisy. 

Slavery was said to be the sum total of all vil- 
lainy, and the slavery of sin is its worst form ; and 
this horrible condition can be traced back in nearly 
all cases to selfishness, that has its most common 



Avarice and Hypocrisy. 171 

phase in money-getting, and to hypocrisy, in which a 
man, striving to deceive his fellow man and his God, 
ends in deceiving himself. The great curse, the curse 
of all curses that afflict humanity to-day, is intem- 
perance in the use of intoxicating drinks. War, pes- 
tilence and famine are as nothing to this foul, insinu- 
ating disease, that degrades the body and destroys the 
soul. The tears it has wrung from broken hearts 
would make a sea ; the crime it has created would fill 
hell ; the disease it is the author of would make the 
earth a loathsome pest-house of foul disorders. And 
yet Christ did not denounce intemperance, because 
he struck at its root in the selfishness of the money- 
getter who traffics for gain on the miseries of hu- 
manity, and the selfishness of the man who walks 
over broken hearts to the gratification of a vile 
passion. 

Small wonder that women grow frantic and good 
men wild in the face of this terrible curse ; for the 
drunkard's grave is found in the utter ruin of the 
household. Could it be arrested, peace would fall 
like sun-light on our homes; our prisons would be 
almost depopulated and poor-houses needless. 

God give us wisdom to treat and strength to con- 
quer this horrible curse, that misery may be lifted 
from the wife, wretchedness from the children and 
agony from gray hairs ! 



172 Sunday Meditations. 

Hypocrisy, which means we are told, stealing the 
livery of God to serve the devil in, assumes the worst 
form when the wearer deceives himself. 

It is a law of our nature that we can not assume 
the unnatural long without making it a part of our 
nature. The man who says, and repeats for the pur- 
pose of impressing others " I hate," ends in hating. 
The fish of the Mammoth Cave are without eyes, and 
the hypocrite passes inevitably to moral blindness. 
The hypocrite, as we have said, begins in an attempt 
to deceive his fellow-men and his maker, and termi- 
nates in making a monster of himself. Who has 
seen the rich hypocrite, in his velvet-cushioned pew, 
listening devoutly to that other hypocrite preach from 
his marble pulpit of sins two thousand years old, and 
not felt a sense of shame at a mockery that makes 
the devil laugh and angels weep ? The two have eyes 
that see no duty, ears that are deaf to the cries of 
distress, that go up in wails of despair about them, 
while their feelings anticipate death in their foul 
decay. 

And what is the meaning of that terrible warn- 
ing of Christ to beware of that which kills the soul? 
Can the soul die ? Is there a suicide of crime ? Is it 
possible that through our self-degradation we may 
wound and at last destroy that which we thought im- 
mortal? Let us hope not. Christ, who denounced 



Avarice and Hypocrisy. 173 

the sin, pitied, and promised forgiveness to the sinner. 
And yet He has uttered that terrible warning that 
comes ringing through the ages like the voice of fate, 
to beware of that which kills the soul, and it carries 
in it the horrible fear of annihilation. And His words 
were not vain. They are our law. 



174 Sunday Meditations. 



(Dan's Intellect. 

We, who rank ourselves next Deity in the crea- 
tion, are troubled to find how little store our Savior 
places by that upon which we base our claim to con- 
sideration — our intellect. We are reasoning creatures, 
and differ in this from all animated creation. We 
think, will and remember, and, possessed of these 
God-like faculties, we arrogate to ourselves an im- 
mortality denied the animals. For us was this earth 
made, and order called from out chaos, and light 
created and warmth made, that we may have food. 
For us a heaven exists, where God lives, and but for 
this one purpose there would be no heaven and no 
God. We think, will and remember; therefore are 
we immortal. We have each our individuality; 
therefore are we immortal. And we cultivate our 
reason, we seek to penetrate the mysteries of nature; 
therefore are we like unto God — immortal. 

Poor fool, our reason stumbles upon the threshold. 
It gropes blindly, seeing nothing. It reaches out 
and touches nothing. And the learned man says, 
" Listen. I see naught, I feel naught, I touch naught ; 
your belief is foolishness, your faith a superstition." 
Even so. We know that we are immortal because 



Man's Intellect. 175 

Christ was mortal. He died, and the marble-jawed 
death that through all the ages had been dark, cruel, 
and silent as the grave, at his bidding revealed its 
precious secret. Every minute a mortal dies, and 
every minute, through ages on ages, a cry of agony 
went up, for that the grave had closed like fate over the 
life of one lost forever. But the angel of the Lord 
rolled away the stone, and from the dark, mysterious 
depths, Christ crucified, Christ who had died, walked 
forth and gave us what reason failed to teach or 
learning find. 

And Christ, appealing to our affections and not 
our intellect, selected ignorant, simple-minded men to 
be His disciples, and confided His mission to His 
mother before He gave it to the world. There were 
in that day, as in this — 

"Kings of thought, 
Who wage contention in their time's decay, 
And of the past are all that will not pass away." 

He might have appealed to such. He might have 
gathered learned priests, sages, and philosophers 
about Him, and making them the depositories of His 
treasures, left His divine mission in their hands. But 
He had nothing to leave such as these. In all His life 
on earth there is not one scientific fact given us. 
For thousands and thousands of years, the children 



176 Sunday Meditations. 

of men saw the sun rise and set, and they said it was 
made for us, and moves for our comfort. The stars 
were studied, that they might foretell the future of 
men. Comets in their minds were messengers sent 
to tell us of wars, pestilence, and famine. Did Christ 
see and hear these errors, and could not He who 
taught us such precious truths ahout ourselves have 
also taught us the truth of these things, and so clear 
the brain of falsehoods ? Doubtless. Yet He did not. 
For, after all, of what avail is such learning? 

When a man dies the world ends. For the brief, 
troubled years of his life, what gain is there in meas- 
uring bits of space, weighing the heavenly bodies, or 
counting back, by milestones given us in geology, the 
dim age of our earth? It is of these things one con- 
cerns himself when the dread hour of parting ap- 
proaches? The greatest and most learned of men 
has closed his eyes in that sleep which knows no 
wakening, with no thought of the scientific truths 
his mind may rise to in that other and higher sphere 
hereafter. Alas ! no, his heart, if he have any, longs 
for the presence of the dear wife, or child, or parent, 
who faded from his poor, arms long, long before ! 
Many a monarch would give his crown and his earthly 
possessions for one little breath to animate into life 
again the dead child before him. In the presence of 



Man's Intellect. 177 

these things the material creation resolves itself into 
atoms, and is to us a barren, lifeless waste. 

It is pathetic, and at times pitiful, to note the 
childlike faith and simplicity with which these hum- 
ble tent-makers and fishermen follow their Lord and 
Master. He came when the work and teachings of 
the prophets had come to be traditionary. God 
seemed to have withdrawn Himself from the self- 
styled, chosen people, and the miracles worked in 
their behalf had grown dim in the distance of a past 
the priests alone kept in memory and taught their 
followers. Nothing tends to make a religious faith 
bigoted so much as doubt. The fear in the mind of 
the believer that his belief is not a truth excites the 
combative ; for one does not question a palpable fact, 
such as sunlight or night; and to deny a faith 
founded on that which lies outside and beyond our 
experience, is not only to insult the believer, but to 
disturb in his own mind that which it is his desire 
to believe. Christ came in fulfillment of the prophe- 
cies, but in deadly antagonism to the teachings of 
the prophets. The God of Israel was a God of ven- 
geance; Christ taught a God of love, pity and for- 
giveness. The church rose in arms against this. 
The Messiah it looked for was to come in the glory 
; of mailed hosts, to kill or enslave the enemies of Is- 
rael. The Son of David, the carpenter born in a 



178 Sunday Meditations, 

stable, was first an object of contempt, and then, 
when His power was shown and His teachings took 
hold upon the heart of the people, He was regarded 
with hate and terror. 

He did not come down from the mount, about 
whose summit the clouds gathered and the deafening 
thunder rolled, with the law, to lead the tribes in 
bloody wars to great victories ; He consoled the af- 
flicted, healed the sick and raised the dead, And 
yet He exacted as high courage from His followers as 
the mailed prophets of old. He demanded the cour- 
age of endurance, that harmonized with the love He 
taught, and He gave them an example of both qual- 
ities. Hence it was that He recognized the public 
baptism of John the Baptist, and organized a church 
wherein His followers could be seen. He had scorn 
and contempt for the mere forms of the Hebrew 
church. He questioned their meaning and violated 
their commands; but He would accept no one who 
feared to assume His dress, that meant persecution 
and death. He bids Peter put up his sword, but at 
the last supper he regards Him in pity, akin to con- 
tempt, as one who will deny Him when the hour of 
trial comes. 

This is the meaning of baptism. It was the 
public initiation of members who could brave the 
sneers of the world and die in meek submission un- 



Man's Intellect. 179 

der the stoning of a mob or in the arena of wild 
beasts. This is all changed now. We do not realize 
to-day that it requires the same courage to deny the 
divinity of Christ that distinguished the early Chris- 
tian when he avowed his belief. The true Christian 
now must pass from that to what baptism implies, 
which opens to love, charity, forgiveness of our ene- 
mies, and the self-denial that consults the good of 
others. Without these the mere form comes to be 
the dry husk that Christ trampled in scorn beneath 
His feet. Baptism means a continual submersion in 
the healing waters of God's love. Are we honest in 
our dealings, are we kind and patient in our ways, 
do we control our selfish passions and confess our 
sins with heartfelt resolve to sin no more? Then 
are we baptized in the water that was made holy by 
the blood of our Savior. If we are, He will smile 
upon and forgive us. He will not give us riches, nor 
honors, nor health, nor the love of children, nor the 
praise of men ; but He will give us that which is 
dearer than all — peace of mind, power to endure, 
purity of soul, that, beginning heaven on earth, 
passes that heaven into the promised hereafter. 



180 Selected Prose Sketches. 



SELECTED PROSE SKETCHES, 



fl Tribute to an Humble friend. 

I have but now returned, in melancholy mood, 
from a funeral. Now, do'nt laugh. It was the burial 
of a dog, and the dog was solemnly interred in the 
family vault, with more real mourners than the aver- 
age lot of deceased humanity is honored with. 

Poor little Frank departed this life without any 
resignation whatever, for he objected to the latest 
moment to his taking off. He was old, with all the 
infirmities of age, half blind, nearly deaf, and quite 
toothless ; yet to the last he looked up to me with a 
pathetic protest in his dim eyes. Frank would not 
" say die " even when all was dead but his brain, for 
he went off from paralysis. 

This member of our family was given us four- 
teen years ago by Frank Gassaway, at "Washington. 
I exhibited my usual eccentricity by being a friend of 
Gassaway. I recognized in him a man of genius, and 
take comfort in the fact that the Prince of Wales and 
Labouchere, of London Truth, confirm my opinion by 



A Tribute to an Humble Friend. 181 

pronouncing Gassaway's poetry some of the best, most 
beautiful, and original in the English language. Frank 
Gassaway is naturally a good fellow, but he made the 
not uncommon mistake of thinking it clever to seem 
bad. The really clever bad man strives to appear 
virtuous, and gets in the way after a while of being 
to some extent what he pretends. The reverse is the 
history of the good fellow who takes on the charac- 
ter of smartness as a wrong- doer. He ends by be- 
ing what he has striven, with much persuasion, to 
make others believe. 

However, it is about Frank the dog, and not 
Frank the poet and humorist, I took pen in hand to 
memorize. Frank the dog came to us from Frank 
the poet not long after he got his eyes open (I mean 
the pet, not the poet), and was a black-and-tan so 
diminutive I could stow him away in my pocket. He 
grew apace, and at an early age developed the intel- 
lectual traits that made him a noted member of our 
domestic circle. All the peculiarities and tricks that 
subsequently made him noted were evolved out of his 
own inner consciousness. His education was badly 
neglected by us. He was self-taught, and had all the 
conceit that comes of such teachings. 

He discovered, for instance, at an early day that 
the meals were the most important events in our 
household, and his keen interest developed itself into 



182 Selected Prose Sketches. 

noting the hours and recognizing the bells, especially 
the first and second bell of a morning, and his ac- 
tivity in getting us all into the dining-room was to 
the last extent comical. He would run from room to 
room, barking up each member of the family, and 
never resting until he had all present and accounted 
for. 

As I have been remarked through life as a man 
never known to keep an engagement unless I was to 
be married on it, and of consequence generally late 
to my meals, I worried Frank beyond endurance. 
The pleasantest sleep with me is that which comes, 
regular as the day, between the two bells of the 
morning meal. There is an ebb in the tide of life 
that seems to reach its lowest level about three or 
four a. M. of every day. At this time patients dying 
from exhaustion lose their frail hold on life, and pass 
to that silent unknown where the wicked cease to 
trouble and the weary are at rest. 

I know this has been contradicted by physicians, 
who assert their bills of mortality do not sustain the 
assured fact. My very clever physician and friend, 
John A. Murphy, explained this by saying that peo- 
ple who die from some wasting disease are apt to slip 
their cable at that time, but it did not hold good in 
cases of violent dissolution, as one could die from an 
accident at any hour. 



A Tribute to an Mumble Friend. 183 

This then with the living is the hour for wake- 
fulness, and the so-called unrest which our wicked 
Lord Byron calls attention to when he says, " It is 
not the night hut the next morning that fetches un- 
pleasant memories," or words to that effect, for I have 
not had a Byron ahout me for twenty years. 

Well, about four a. m. his Satanic Majesty awakens 
me for a little intercourse when seated on the foot- 
hoard of my bed; he runs over not my sins, but my 
follies, for the enemy of man has discovered long since 
that we suffer from the last-named and not the former. 
It may be that in that other world we shall be punished 
for our wickedness in this ; but here below — or above, 
if you will — we suffer from our folly. In the sin com- 
mitted we get some recompense, very inadequate I 
admit, but it is something. In our folly we give our- 
selves away, and get nothing but humiliation and 
shame in return. Having ended, somewhat exhausted, 
my matinee with Satan, he would leave and I turn 
over to sleep. The bells for breakfast denied this 
slumber, and then Frank would come to my door 
and continue his noisy demonstration until I re- 
sponded by rising. 

Often when writing in my den, and far more 
deeply interested in my work than any reader I ever 
secured, Frank would dash in with his wild barking 
to let me know that a hungry family waited below. 



184 Selected Prose Sketches. 

If I paid no attention to his summons, he would race 
out and shortly return with Tiny, a diminutive fe- 
male black-and-tan, and Nibbs, his royal Nibbs, a 
Scotch terrier, and the three would bark at me until 
I followed them to the dining-room. 

I have often marveled at Frank's power to com- 
municate to his dog associates my delinquencies, and 
tell them how to help him, but he did. This is not 
stranger, however, than the fact observed by natural- 
ists that animals have among each other a language 
of their own. There is Spring Grove Cemetery, for 
example, near Cincinnati, of six hundred acres. 
Shooting, trapping, and other brutal assaults on the 
poor, harmless creatures below us are forbidden. The 
result is that the place is thronged with game, as we 
call it, and the wildest and most shy elsewhere sing, 
fly, and swim unconcerned amid the grinding rattle 
of carriages, and' even guns fired over the graves of 
dead soldiers fail to disturb them. 

It is well known that wild fowl, strangers to Ohio, 
are frequently seen on these cemetery ponds. How 
they come to be there is the mystery. I suppose 
some wood-duck or wild-goose of our region meets 
a stranger away off on the coast of the Carolinas 
amid the rice-fields, and tells him that if he have oc- 
casion to cross Ohio, there is a nice place near Cin- 



A Tribute to an Humble Friend. 185 

cinnati where he can rest secure and get a good 
square meal. 

Frank's knowledge of English was limited, but 
perfect as far as it went. A servant could put his 
head in at the door, and say any thing but breakfast, 
lunch, or dinner, and Frank would pay no attention 
to the communication. But let any of those magic 
words be uttered, and the little fellow would be up, 
all excitement, and chase in every member of the 
family. 

He had a high contempt for the cat and parrot. 
He did not consider them ornamental, and as for any 
useful duties about the house they were not worth a 
Confederate bond. The parrot had, as parrots are 
wont to do, picked up a few choice phrases, and among 
the rest calls for the dogs. Now, although Poll imi- 
tated the voices of various members of the family in 
a skillful and superior manner, she never deceived 
Frank. Lazily asleep on the rug, the little fellow 
would open his eyes and look contempt at the par- 
rot, and it needed no words to say, " You miserable 
green-coated humbug, you can't fool any body." 

Our diminutive friend developed his sagacity in 
early youth. One night Dick Troin was writing in 
the library of our house at Washington, and was dis- 
turbed by the fuss Frank was guilty of on the sofa 
behind the pen-driver. He would whine, growl, bark, 
16 



186 Selected Prose Sketches. 

and jump until Dick looked around and saw the lit- 
tle fellow trying to cover himself with the afghan. 
Seeing that he was noticed at last, Frank dropped 
the afghan he was tugging at, looked wistfully at 
the writer, and then barked. Dick, understanding 
the appeal, kindly covered the little fellow, that, 
curling up with a satisfied air, was after as quiet as a 
mouse. 

Ever after, when nine o'clock came of an evening, 
Frank's mistress would say, " Come, my little man, 
it is bedtime," and he would solemnly proceed up- 
stairs to his bed. This was at the head of the stairs 
in the hall above, and one night he was sent to it, and 
in a few minutes he came down rapidly, barking with 
much animation. His mistress, rebuking him for 
such unseemly conduct, ordered him back again. 
He went reluctantly, with head and tail down. In a 
few seconds, however, down he came again as before. 
Knowing that something unusual was the matter, I 
returned with him, and my dear wife, believing the 
long-expected man had arrived and been discovered 
by Frank, accompanied us. We found that Maltese 
Tom, Frank's enemy, a huge cat, had curled up in 
the poor fellow's bed. Frank looked at the intruder, 
then at us, as much as to say, " Did you ever see 
such impudence ?" Tom was rattled out and Frank 
duly installed with the comfort well over him. As I 



A Tribute to an Humble Friend. 187 

retired that night I saw that Tom had returned, and 
was lying sound asleep on the dog. Frank evidently 
thought that kind hands had added a cover to his 
couch, and, as the night was bitter cold, he had ac- 
cepted the addition. 

Writing of winter; one very cold and stormy 
season found poor old Frank suffering from the 
rheumatism. He was so crippled in his old age as to 
be scarcely able to move. He slept in his mistress' 
room near the fire, and during the day kept up a mix- 
ture of whine and growl* that would have been com- 
ical had it not been so pathetic, for his grumbling 
complaint came of extreme pain. Of a morning he 
would crawl out of bed, limp and stagger over to the 
window, pausing every few steps as if about to give it 
up. On reaching the sill he would rear up and look 
out, If the sun was shining, he would remain out of 
bed all day; if not, and the morning was stormy, he 
would turn his old gray-haired, wrinkled face away 
with a disgusted expression and crawl back to bed, 
where he would growl and whine like a little old 
man, complaining of his wretched condition and the 
neglect he suffered. 

Frank was strangely devoid of the affection that 
marks the dog generally. He was animated by a 
high sense of duty. He felt that he was born to a 
mission, and, while he abstained from crowding his 



188 Selected Prose Sketches. 

convictions down the throats of others, he was care- 
ful not to be influenced by any past favor or affection. 
When any suspicious character came about, Frank, 
feeling that he could not try conclusions of brute 
strength, had a way of attacking the culprit in the 
rear by swiftly and noiselessly approaching and biting 
at the calf of the intruder. 

A lightning-rod man once jumped from his wagon 
and came toward our door. Frank saw my expres- 
sion of disgust and made for the intruder. He was 
a tall, broad-shouldered piece of animated nuisance. 
Frank passed him, unobserved by the victim, and 
turning, gave the bore one nip with his needle-like 
teeth. The fellow roared and seemed to 'jump a rod, 
" Gewillikins !" he cried, seeing Frank, "I thought 
I .was snake-bit !" 

The only instance I ever saw in him of affection 
Miss Austine Snead, the clever correspondent, put 
to record. She was a great friend of Frank's, and 
met him after four years' absence. Frank singled 
her out from the group of late arrivals at our home, 
and went wild in his expressions of delight. 

Women are sneered at on account of their fond- 
ness for canine pets. The sneer is the shallow ex- 
pression of a shallow brain. Our sublime egotism 
belittles all of God's works but ourselves. We alone 
are worthy His creation, and this in face of the fact 



A 'IriOute to an Humble Friend. 189 

that in His divine wisdom he gave the dog qualities 
superior to any we possess. The dog ranks us in 
courage, devotion, duty, and gratitude. Had we one- 
tenth of the attributes that mark the dog, it would 
not have been possible for us to crucify our Savior. 

Dogs are my companions and friends, and good 
company they are. I never met but one friend who 
could talk ten minutes on any other subject than 
themselves. It is a very tiresome subject. Dear old 
Jerry Black was the only exception ; he encouraged 
a fellow in the fellow's egotism, and it was delirious. 
Dogs are the best listeners on legs. 



190 Selected Prose Sketches. 



Little Ghristy's Christmas. 

It was Christmas eve, and Christmas eve always 
fetches snow in Christmas stories. In the locality I 
treat of snow made the rule, clear weather the ex- 
ception. It had been falling at intervals all day and 
as night came on, the storm, if I may use such a word 
when there was no wind, gave us heavy flakes, that 
fell as silently as the ballad sung of, that is said to 
execute the freeman's will. It contributed its silence 
to the busy city, and padding the thoroughfares, 
stilled the noisy horror of the stony streets. Heav- 
ily laden cars, so crowded that passengers hung to 
them like a swarm of bees to the limb of a tree, and 
each pulled by four smoking and weary horses, 
moved noiselessly, save after each stop, when driver 
and conductor joined in yells and whip-cracking at 
the worn out and much-tortured beasts. Drays, carts 
and heavy wagons hurrying home from work passed 
without the rattle that usually warns people on foot 
of their approach. From the black sky above came 
the white snow, like blessings that turn to evil as 
they touch the earth. 

The streets were thronged, and the toy shops 
and fancy stores, lit with electric lights, were crowded 



L'ittle Christy's Christmas. 191 

by people purchasing presents for the Christ day, that 
of all others tells of good will to little folk on earth. 
Ladies, from silken-lined and silver-plated car- 
riages, now fringed with winter's white, and patient 
coachmen that resembled so many Santa Claus, filled 
their warm vehicles with all sorts of bundles, while 
men, from fur-clad brokers and merchants to poor 
mechanics, were sturdily tramping through the storm, 
with their hands and arms full of gifts for the dear 
ones at home. The patter of little feet and the sound 
of sweet voices, now echoed in the heart, claiming 
their day, the crowning glory of all the days in the 
year. 

One of the crowd who trudged along had the 
heavy tread and coarse dress of a day laborer. In 
his hand he held the tin bucket that so unmistakably 
indicates the calling. This poor fellow was also in 
search of gifts, but seemed hard to please. Standing 
in the glare of the electric lights, the clerks — es- 
pecially the female clerks — gave him scant atten- 
tion. His dull, rugged, pock-marked face had little 
attraction in it, and his coarse wear indicated small 
purchase and less profit. Paying no attention to the 
neglect and snubs he experienced from the attend- 
ants, he passed from shop to shop, and after an ex- 
penditure of twenty-five cents, found himself pos- 
sessed of a few toys. They were of the rudest sort. 



192 Selected Prose Sketches. 

I pledge my word of honor that an ingenious Yankee 
could have whittled them out of a few shingles in 
twenty minutes. Cheap paint in the hands of a ready 
artist had given to the supposed likeness of the ani- 
mals produced a wild, insane expression that rendered 
the resemblance quite improbable. Wrapping them 
in brown paper he placed them under his rough coat 
and started homeward. 

Martin Calkins, for by that name was my man 
known, a common day laborer, never indulged in the 
luxury of a car ride, from economical considerations. 
By walking from his work to his den he could save 
five cents, which, added to another five, enabled him 
to pay for a drink at a free lunch and so secure a 
better supper than he would find at home. 

This was Martin's theoretical economy. The 
practice differed somewhat, as with all of us, for hav- 
ing indulged in one glass he took two or three others, 
so that when this economist reached his wretched 
lodging he was full, while his pocket was empty. 

This sort of club life Mrs. Calkins resented, and 
being a woman and ill-tempered generally, let loose 
her indignation in certain expressions far more forci- 
ble than polite. Liquor did not develop good nature 
in Martin, and regarding Mrs. Calkins as his prop- 
erty, he usually enforced a proper respect for his mar- 



Little Christy's Christmas, 193 

ital rights by beating her into silence if not sub- 
mission. 

On the night in question he stumbled up two 
nights of dark, dirty stairs to the room of the tene- 
ment house he called home, and opening the thin 
door with a kick, rolled in. 

The interior presented a scene of squalid pov- 
erty, in the midst of which, cowering over a handful 
of coal, sat Mrs. Calkins in a faded calico, pathetic- 
ally hid under an old shawl pulled close about her 
shoulders. 

The room, brought to view by an ill-trimmed 
kerosene lamp, would have made a house dog drop 
his head aud tail in abject depression. The low ceil- 
ings and walls were almost black from smoke and 
dirt, while from the corners were festooned cobwebs 
that seemed moist and hoary with accumulated iilth. 
The furniture consisted of an old bedstead, suggestive 
of vermin, the bed-clothes thereon made up of dirty 
blankets edged with a sheet of denser hue, and pre- 
senting an uneven topography that evidenced an un- 
tying strata of packed straw. At the side of the bed 
was a cheap cradle with a child therein that had out- 
grown its resting place, and slept with its iittle knees 
drawn up and head touching the head-board. A 
pine table and two rickety chairs made the rest of 
the furniture. The floor was bare, save where stains 
17 



194 Selected Prose Sketches. 

of tobacco varied the general dirt. The two cur- 
tainless windows resembled the eye sockets of a skull 
— a haunted skull — for as the fire-light flashed and 
fell the empty sockets were filled with sudden glares 
that resembled ghostly glances at the exterior. 

Martin, shaking the snow from his clothes, as 
would a Newfoundland dog, fell into a chair with a 
force that made the old split-bottom scream as if its 
rheumatic joints were being dislocated in great 
agony. 

The woman, with a, sullen expression, looked at 
him from the corner of her eyes without turning, 
and said : " Well, have you brought me what you 
promised?" 

" Brought myself," he answered, " and that 's 
about all." 

" So I expected," she replied, more to herself 
than her husband. Then, after a long pause, added : 
"Want supper?" 

" No, I do n't," he responded. 

" Oh ! of course not. Do n't want none. Got 
yourself full of oysters and whisky, while we starve." 

" What's the matter of you, Meg? Now, out 
with it, old woman. What is it, I say?" 

" Oh ! you do n't know, of course you do n't. 
You are so innocent, you are. You did n't promise 
me money to-night to take kid and me to see my 



Little Christy's Christmas. 195 

folks, and you hav n't put all the money down your 
mean throat. Oh, no ; and you ask me what 's the 
matter ! " 

Martin Calkins was that most hideous of all 
beasts known as the husband at common law — the 
creature that absorbs the wife and the wife's right 
No slave of the south, or anywhere else, was so op- 
pressed as the wife of such a husband. Blackstone 
tells us that it is his right to chastise her. Practice 
has taught that it is in his power to kill, provided he 
does -so by slow torture, of blows and abuse, and 
fails to put her out of her misery with a knife or 
an ax. 

The discussion on this occasion ended, as such 
generally did, in Mrs. Calkins getting her ears boxed 
and her wretched anatomy well shaken. She took 
her punishment in silence, as a matter of course, 
only shielding her pale, thin face with her arms, as 
she was averse to appearing before her neighbors 
with blackened eyes and a scarred countenance. 

The brute Calkins had several times been ar- 
rested for this violence to his wife. In every in- 
stance, however, she refused to prosecute. This is 
generally the case, and is attributed by our senti- 
mental world to a slavish love and submission on the 
part of the wife. The fact is, as the punishment 
consists of fine and imprisonment, the wife and chil- 



196 Selected Prose Sketches. 

clren are the main sufferers, for, while the brutal 
bread-winner is maintained in jail, the family remain 
at home to starve. If the law were so amended as 
to put the wife beater at work, and give the wages 
to the family, the wifely love and submission would 
not be so apparent. Even then the poor woman 
would be in terror of immediate death when the 
beast had worked out his term of imprisonment. I 
believe with Bergh that the better punishment would 
be the whipping-post in the public .square, or say 
hanging. 

Soon after the beating, the wife went to bed, 
leaving her husband by the dying fire, smoking his 
pipe. He sat for hours gazing at the few coals that 
gave out little light and less heat. All about him, 
throughout the dismal tenement house, were heard 
noises that indicated that the huge honeycomb of 
filth and poverty was ending its Christmas eve. 
There were shoutings and poundings, coarse and 
shrill voices singing, and through it all came the 
strain of a fiddle that sounded like the wail of an old 
female opera chorus singing in hades. 

We have, it is claimed, sixty-five millions of souls 
on this continent of ours, called the people of the 
United States. Of these about five millions read 
newspapers, and about three of the five read books. 

Now, we of the book-making and book-reading 



Little Christy's Christmas. 197 

few, have certain superstitions by which we are in- 
fluenced. One of these is that we number very 
nearly that of the entire nation, and the other, that 
through our intellectual efforts we are doing a tre- 
mendous business of a missionary sort, toward ele- 
vating the masses. 

The white caps of a local storm have about as 
much control of the measureless depths and bound- 
less limits of the ocean as this little class has of the 
sixty-two millions. Immediately beneath lies the un- 
moved and unmovable weight of dead ignorance, and 
beneath that again the monsters of the deep, in all 
the forms of vice flesh is heir to. The educated few 
are in influence about as the fly upon the wheel. 
And how they labor and look wise in their efforts at 
reformation of humanity! And what a quantity of 
beautiful little Christmas stories we have, telling all 
about a class of laborers they know as little of as 
that class knows of them. 

We do not know, and can never learn, it seems, 
that the deep yet delicate affection we have for one 
another comes of culture and training in the pre- 
cepts of our Savior, and as we pass down the scale 
of humanity we lose all of that and approach the 
brute creation. 

Martin's love for his child, if I may use that sacred 
word in this connection, was of the sort, but of less 



198 Selected Prose Sketches. 

intensity, that a cow feels for her calf or a lion for 
its cub. And as such animal he sat brooding over 
the dying fire, thinking of what a fool he was to have 
burdened himself with a family. 

Awaking at last from a sleep that nearly tumbled 
him from the old chair, he proceeded to pull off his 
heavy spiked shoes that he softly placed upon the 
floor ; rising noiselessly as he could from his creaking 
chair, he stole toward the bed. 

Every plank he pressed, however, had a voice of 
warning, and, pause as he might, feel his way as 
cautiously as he could, his approach was accom- 
panied by sharp cracks, unheard during the day. 

He paused by the side of the bed ; his miserable 
wife lay in a heavy sleep ; the storm had passed, and 
at that moment the full moon from the clear, cold 
sky, sent through the dirty windows a flood of light. 
How he longed to put his brawny hand upon that 
slender throat, and by one muscular grasp, end her 
life and his struggles together. Resisting the temp- 
tation, more through fear than affection, he continued 
his stealthy way until he reached the foot of the bed, 
and there found a poor, little, almost footless stock- 
ing suspended from a nail. He took the cheap 
toys from his breast and carefully thrust them into 
the stocking. Having accomplished this he rolled 
into bed. 



Little Christy's Christmas. 199 

Christmas morning broke with dazzling bright- 
ness upon the city, and the cold, sunlit air was tremu- 
lous with the cries of children, explosion of Chinese 
crackers and the merry jingle of sleigh-bells. Mrs. 
Calkins was the first of her little family to rise, and 
she began at once her household cares. The day was 
the same to her as all other days. She rekindled her 
fire, using with caution a small quantity of kerosene, 
and then seizing a bucket went out to the common 
hydrant below. Detained there awaiting her turn, 
and by some gossip with neighbors made more than 
usually interesting by the quarrels, fights and killing 
of the night before, she found, on her return, that 
Martin had gone out. 

This absence did not disturb the wife. She was 
accustomed to the morning drink, which, on this sa- 
cred day, would probably take until noon to end. It 
is a little singular that when a man, owing to his 
poverty, can not buy any thing else, he can procure 
bottled insanity. I wish some economist could find a 
reason for this, and, if possible, a remedy. I suppose 
the profit in liquor dealing is so great that a wide 
margin of credit exists, and is limited only by the 
gutter. When an inebriate gets so low that he is a 
dirty nuisance the credit ceases, and he can only get 
drunk for cash. 

Mrs. Calkins, having put her poor breakfast to 



200 Selected Prose Sketches. . 

cook, wakened her boy, the only living child out of 
four born to her wretchedness, and proceeded to dress 
the little four-year-old in his best clothes. These 
best were rude enough, and with a rough ablution in 
cold water set the little fellow on his feet. 

The boy was unusually impatient on this occasion, 
and got some shaking and blows with the open hand 
for his hurry. As soon as released he ran around 
the foot of the bed, and with a cry of delight returned 
with the toys he had discovered. 

" See, Musser !" he cried, his little face brighten- 
ing, " wot dood Santy Claus fetch me." He held up, 
grasped in his two little hands, the selection and pur- 
chase of the night before. 

Now, while the mass of grown people among the 
uncultivated, have dull, inexperienced, and hard faces, 
their children, under six years of age, generally pos- 
sess not only innocent countenances, but strangely 
sensitive, and thoughtful ones, as if fresh from the 
hands of the Creator. They are unspoiled by the 
rough life to which they are born. 

Little Christy, although his cheeks were hollow, 
lips thin, and eyes unnaturally large, actually ap- 
peared beautiful as he appealed, in his delight, to his 
mother. 

The delight was not reciprocated. The angry 
woman saw in the toys some of the money that had 



Little Christy's Christmas. 201 

been promised her for a trip to the country with her 
child. The wrath, at this find, was intensified by 
jealousy engendered by the child's preference for the 
brute of a husband, who had long since beaten all 
love out of her heart. 

A flash of anger lit up her careworn face very like 
a gleam of heat lightning over a dark cloud, and, 
seizing the toys, she thrust them in the fire under the 
hissing pan. 

The look of mingled amazement and grief on the 
child's face was pitiable. Its thin lips trembled, tears 
welled into the large eyes, and a choking sob, not of 
grief, but of an attempt to repress its grief, came con- 
vulsively from its throat. The attempted repression 
was a failure. With a wild cry the poor child started 
forward to rescue its precious gifts. The mother met 
the move with a stinging slap on the ear that nearly 
threw down the little sufferer. At the same instant 
the wife felt herself seized by the throat. 

Martin had entered the room unseen by the wife, 
and took in the situation at a glance. Without a word 
he pinned her to the wall. She saw death in his 
face, and as he swung her around to dash her again 
at the wall, she uttered a wild shriek that rung 
through the entire house. It was her last. She fell 
senseless to the floor, and her husband was about to 
finish his work with a kick in the head, when the 



202 Selected Prose Sketches. 

door was burst open and half a dozen stout men 
seized and held him. The woman was put to bed, 
the poor-house physician sent for, while at the same 
time the police were called in and Martin was tumbled 
into a patrol wagon and carted to prison. 

The cause of this disturbance, little Christopher, 
stood, at first, dazed. Then, recovering from his 
amazement, he saw his father being dragged away, 
and, all unnoticed in the confusion, followed the police 
with their prisoner down the stairs. When the patrol 
wagon was driven away, he ran after, diving through 
the heavy snow in a vain effort to keep the vehicle in 
sight. He failed in this, of course, and when it dis- 
appeared he stopped, looked about him, and began 
crying. 

The child was lost, and according to received au- 
thorities known as Christmas stories, after wander- 
ing for hours, and when half starved and nearly 
frozen, he should have been picked up by a fur-clad, 
full-stomached, miserly old broker, at that moment 
full of remorse at having abandoned his daughter at 
an early age of this child, and lived through all his 
years with no other occupation than the sinful one of 
accumulating money. Of course little Christopher 
should prove to be the millionaire's grandchild. 

Heaven forbid that I should doubt the existence 
of such fur-clad, full-stomached old brokers. I have 



Little Christy's Christmas. 203 

known quite a number of them, and from what I saw, 
consider them men liable to abandon their offspring 
for the sinful accumulation of filthy lucre. But that 
such operator in Wall street should have an attack of 
sudden compunction and a waif at the same time is 
not probable, but it is possible, or it would not be 
so frequently rehearsed in novel and play. This, 
however, was not little Christy's luck, and as I 
am dealing with the hard realities of life, I can 
not venture to lug in the conscience-stricken broker 
aforesaid. 

The boy did encounter a burly policeman, who 
at once recognized a lost child, although Christy was 
in sight of his home. A society for the better pro- 
tection of children had not only issued an order to 
have strays of this sort taken to the nearest police 
station, but had offered a reward for each rescue. It 
is astonishing what a number of stray children were 
found after this regulation. 

The station to which Christy was carried, had in 
it a number of cells, for temporary confinement, and 
while the officer was making note of the newly found 
in the dingy, ill-ventilated hall, a rough face was 
pressed against the bars of a near cell, and a husky 
voice said : 

" Christy." 



204 Selected Frose Sketches. 

The child with a cry of " Dad " dashed forward, 
and thrust his little arms through the bars. 

" The kid is mine," said the prisoner, " Can't you 
let him in? " 

" The devil it is," responded the officer, and then 
added : " Don't know about that. Might kill him, as 
it is charged you did the mother." 

"I guess not," was the quiet reply, "T whacked 
her on account of the kid." 

At this point Christy began crying in a low piti- 
ful way. The policeman, not knowing what better 
to do, opened the iron door, and Christy, with a cry 
of delight, sprang into his father's arms. This so 
moved the hardened conservators of the peace, that 
one emptied his pocket of candies meant for his own 
children, while another, remembering it was Christ- 
mas day, sallied out and returned with a number of 
toys for the little fellow. 

I know that this seems improbable, but when I 
add that this benevolent guardian of the peace was 
shortly after discharged for leaving his beat to take a 
doctor to the bedside of his sick wife, my skeptical 
reader will feel satisfied. 

Seated upon the floor of the warm cell, the child 
ate his sweets and played with his toys, looking up 
at intervals to assure himself that his dad was yet 
present. The heavy air of the badly-ventilated place 



Little Christy's Christmas. 205 

told at last upon the little chap, and he dropped into 
a sound sleep. From this he awakened in his father's 
arms, and looking up saw the stars twinkling through 
the bars of the prison windows. And thus little 
Christy's Christmas came to an end. 



206 Selected Prose Sketches. 



The Worries that Ifill. 

That part of our animal economy, supposed to 
be the seat of the affections, is considered so elastic 
that the above phrase causes laughter. And yet, at 
rare intervals, something vital gives way, in that part 
of us, and the man, or woman, renders up the ghost 
as completely as if some well defined disease, recog- 
nized by the medicated world, had struck its fatal 
blow. 

A broken heart is not only laughed at, but the 
scientific gentlemen, who know all about it, insist 
that the heart is nothing but a pump, placed within 
for the better control of the circulation, and has no 
more feeling in it than the bone of the big toe. And 
so, in their wisdom, they transfer the afleetions to the 
brain. 

What positive rot all such speculations are. I 
knew an officer in the late war, who was shot in the 
head, and lived some months after. The bullet entered 
at comparison, and was supposed to have traversed 
benevolence, firmness and lodged in self-esteem. The 
man died, of course, but he went on dying, in about 
as sensible a manner as he had lived. We who 
nursed him, could not perceive any loss of intellectual 



The Worries that Kill 207 

power. The test was scarcely fair, for your average 
army officer is not one of those brilliant specimens 
whose gain or loss of the thoughtful processes can be 
easily marked and recorded. 

We locate the intellect in the skull, because we 
feel it is there. The late Jeremiah S. Black was 
wont to say that a legal argument by William Evarts 
made his head ache. In the same way we put the 
emotions in the heart. We feel them there. 

The poor fellow watching at the bedside of a 
stricken wife, or the mother hanging over the cradle 
of a dying child, gauges the progress of the dread 
disease by a sinking sensation at the heart, which 
clouds the brain, dims the eye, and sends the breath- 
ing up through sobs. 

It is not the thought that kills, or even tires ; it 
is the worry of the heart, and this writes wrinkles on 
the brow of care, and sickens, if it does not shorten, 
life. 

"A great man to be successful," wrote a French 
Bohemian, attributing his axiom to Napoleon, " must 
have a good digestion and a bad heart." 

Fretting over the affairs of life is like friction in 
machinery — it heats, wears and retards. The car- 
wheel was made a success by an invention that 
brought a soft, cold material that might melt, but 
could not heat, in contact with the axle. 



208 Selected Prose Sketches. 

That the heart is the seat of emotions is better 
proven than phrenology, although we have all dropped 
into that bumptious theory. In phrenology, that is 
so generally accepted, the mind is broken into bumps 
or organs. This absurdity prevails, although, when 
we come to investigate philosophically, we find every 
organ a head in itself. What, for example, is com- 
parison, ideality, without every other intellectual or- 
gan entering into it. I will take any one organ and 
run quite a great man on it. Now nature is not only 
logical but economic, as well, and above all, strangely 
secretive. While the countenance, played upon in- 
cessantly, remains something of a mask, it is not 
likely that bumps would be embossed on the skulls, 
telling to the fingers of a quack the inner secrets of 
a man's characteristics — characteristics unknown to 
the man himself. 

Astrology was better, palmology as good, while 
pedalogy, started by an ingenious friend of mine, is 
quite as conclusive. Who sees a fat foot, for exam- 
ple, and is not satisfied that the structure above is 
lazy ? A high, well arched instep indicates delicacy 
of organization, even if seen dangling under a gal- 
lows. This is all arrant nonsense, but not more so 
than the so-called science at the other extremity. 

Well, the troubles of the heart have little to do 
with those of the head, nor are they much better un- 



The Worries that Kill. 209 

derstood. It is through such ignorance that conso- 
lation and condolence are so very exasperating. 

The sympathy, for instance, that comes in 
through funeral ceremonies is very trying. At the 
moment when one longs to be alone with one's dead, 
all one's friends and neighbors come in and gaze. 
The beast of an undertaker arranges the remains that 
are lying upon one's breast, for public inspection, 
and all the crowd, speaking in bated breath of the 
weather, the markets, the health of the neighbor- 
hood, pull on long faces and pass by the coffin to take 
a last look at the departed they care nothing for. 
Poor heart, that wants to drive them all out and 
clasp, in agony, the cold form of the dead and fairly 
shriek into the closed ears for a return of one who 
never, never, more may come back to bless us ! 

" Why weepest thou ? Thy tears are unavailing. 
Therefore do I weep." 

It was this shrinking from the undertaker and 
the public on the part of a sensitive wife that gave 
rise to the cruel report that the great war secretary, 
Stanton, had committed suicide. The afflicted widow 
had, through accident, seen an undertaker preparing 
her dead child for burial. The brutal manner in 
which the poor little corpse was being treated so 
shocked her that she vowed that thereafter none but 
18 



210 Selected Prose Sketches. 

loving hands should prepare her dead for the grave. 
The undertaker, therefore, saw the body of the emi- 
nent statesman only in the coffin, and his duty was 
confined to screwing down the lid. This abrupt de- 
parture from common usages, of course, gave rise to 
strange rumors. 

It was my good fortune to know Edwin M. 
Stanton intimately as a brother from my boyhood 
until death separated us. My brother-in-law, Judge 
Nathaniel C. Head, of the Supreme Court of Ohio, 
gave Stanton his first office, that of reporter, and 
Stanton was wont to make Mac-o-cheek his summer 
resort for years. 

Doubtful as it may seem to the secretary's many 
enemies, and he left behind him an army of such, he 
was of a deeply religious nature. Possessed of a 
sensitive temperament, he was subject to great ex- 
tremes of gayety and gloom, and had withal power- 
ful vitality. His powers of endurance were amazing, 
and a force of character, stimulated by an indomita- 
ble will, made him master of all situations and of 
himself. All men thus fitted to this life cling to life 
with an obstinate tenacity. 

He was dying of an incurable disease while in 
the department he controlled with such amazing 
vigor, but, at the bidding of his will, death post- 
poned his doom until his task was ended. 



The Worries that Kill. 211 

I saw his remains the morning of the night he 
died. With hands crossed upon his breast, his reso- 
lute face was softened with an expression resembling 
that of sleep, and I know from what I saw that the 
renowned story of his suicide was false. The stormy 
life of a noble character, marred with more ignoble 
passions than ordinarily falls to the lot of man, had 
passed into silence and memory, quiet as a child. 

This incident has carried me from my theme. 
Of the more beautiful emotions of the human heart, 
humanity is strangely ignorant. Take for illustra- 
tion the touching care and love of a mother for her 
crippled or deformed child. What pity we extend 
to the parent, unaware that in the loving care there 
is a source of great comfort. The same result occurs 
in the nursing of any loved patient. 

James Whitcomb Riley tells me of a humorist, 
the wittiest, most delicate and pure of all that toil in 
our midst, who lived devoted to his invalid wife, and 
in her death suffered as no man ever suffered before 
over a like loss. The little wife, through helpless- 
ness, was more to the poor fellow than a healthy, 
hearty helpmate would have been. 

One summer passed at . Oaklands, amid a great 
crowd of hay-fever patients, I remember vividly, from 
the fact of an artist stricken with paralysis coming 
to pass the summer months accompanied by his wife. 



212 Selected Prose Sketches, 

The painter was on the shady side of life when he 
married a little girl young enough to he his daughter. 
Paralysis followed, and the wife "became his nurse. 
Her quiet care, her unpretending devotion, called 
forth much admy-ation among the throng of people 
at that summer resort. She was his hands, feet, 
voice—his all — and folk looked on wonderingly and 
pitied the poor woman, and when the old man died, 
which he did one night, we all felt relieved, and 
said : " Now the little widow will have some com- 
fort." 

Somehow or other she did not seem to realize 
the great "blessing that had come to her. She wept 
much in a quiet way. Her eyes grew cavernous and 
her cheeks hollow. The poor thing, avoiding sym- 
pathy, passed hours alone. It was so absurdly differ- 
ent from what was expected, and ought to have been 
the fact, that a feeling of impatience, nearly akin to 
dislike, sprung up and spread. 

One morning the widow failed to appear at 
breakfast, a meal she seldom honored by eating. As 
knocking elicited no response, a slender mulatto boy 
was tossed through the transom to unlock the door. 
"When that door was unlocked, we found the little 
widow lying on her back, with her thin hands meekly 
folded on her breast — dead of a broken heart. At 






The Worries that Kill 213 

least, the fashionable doctor pronounced it heart 
disease. 

That which was thought to be a grievous burden 
had, in fact, been a blessing. When the old man, 
numbed in brain and crippled in body, found a refuge 
in the grave, all that she had of life, all its tender- 
ness, love, and sweet, helpful dependence disappeared 
with him, and her little horizon darkened clown to 
death. 



214 Selected Prose Sketches, 



Hamops of the (flap. 

"When General Fremont, then in command of the 
Middle Department, was suddenly ordered to inter- 
cept Stonewall Jackson after that pious old Confed- 
erate had chased General Banks and his little com- 
mand from the Shenandoah Valley, General John 
Charles, as true a soldier and as capable an officer as 
the government possessed, placed his surplus bag- 
gage, sick and wounded, at Petersburg, under the 
command of Captain Lee, with one full company, to 
care for the property and people left behind. 

I write it Captain Lee, for to tell the truth I 
have forgotten the name of the gallant young fellow, 
the hero of my sketch. 

The captain was not well pleased with the duty 
assigned him. He grumbled not a little at the ig- 
noble service of sitting guard over old tents, blankets, 
sick and wounded, while the army marched away to 
glory. And glory it would have been had Fremont 
been really in command of an army. Aside from 
Generals Cluserit's, Schenck's and Milroy's brigades, 
he had worse than nothing, for the force was made 
up of what was known as Blenker's division, Ger- 
man in name, but in reality the scum and dregs of 






Humors of the War. 215 

all nationalities represented in New York, where the 
scoundrelism of the earth makes yearly its foul de- 
posit. Blenker's division was an armed mob of 
thieves, with as much fight in them as discipline, and 
not enough of either to make the men other than a 
burden to us, that demoralized the entire force. For 
example, when Fremont first hit Stonewall's heavy 
forces near Strasbourg, a forced march of an hour 
would have hemmed them in between Fremont's 
army and that under General McDowell. Fremont 
saw the chance and issued his orders accordingly. 
The response was a deliberate halt in the road, and 
two-thirds of our force unslung their kettles and de- 
liberately went to cooking breakfast. ISTo remon- 
strance, no threats nor hard swearing could move 
the solid mass. 

General Schenck, grim as the god of war, sat on 
his horse, surrounded by his staff, and saw the Con- 
federates sweep by and the golden opportunity to 
gobble gone forever. 

I can see now, as if the event were but an hour 
old, the gallant young fellows forming that staff"— the 
handsome Cheesebrough, the cool, impassive Este, the 
witty Crane and impetuous Feilding Lowry, all cul- 
tured gentlemen, brave and gentle. 

" "Well, fellows," I said, " we are being taught 
that something more is necessary to make an army 



216 Selected Prose Sketches. 

than the officer. "While warlike Europe has spent a 
thousand years in the creation of a private, our won- 
derful government spends its vast energies in the 
creation of an officer. When that wonderful produc- 
tion is completed we stand off and say, ' Behold our 
army/ " 

Again, at Cross Keys, subsequent to the above, 
when Stonewall was forced to make a stand, these 
cowardly thieves left Cluserit, Schenck and Milroy 
to do the fighting, while they wandered over the 
country, singly and in gangs, robbing farm-houses 
and murdering unarmed men. 

My little story, however, has nothing to do with 
the march of that army, but seeks to tell what hap- 
pened to our unhappy captain, left in command at 
Petersburg. With him the time wore on drearily 
enough. His camp was infested with copperheads 
au maturely for he had selected a stony eminence, and 
from hidden recesses came out the ugly reptiles at 
all hours, while around were copperheads on end, 
quite as malignant, if not as poisonous. Of these the 
females were far the more noisy and disagreeable. 

A woman comes into the world and grows up so 
surrounded and protected that she never learns and 
appreciates the beauty and efficiency of head-pum- 
meling as a guard against tongue-wagging, and she 
is therefore free to let loose her opinion on all occa- 



Humors of the War. 217 

sions. Captain Lee had a turn for female society, 
being young, handsome and gallant, but he soon 
tired of attempted attentions that were received in 
scorn and garnished by such pleasant epithets as 
" Lincoln hireling," " cowardly Yank," and " Lincoln 
pup." 

One sunny afternoon the captain was sitting, or 
rather reclining, before his tent, looking vacantly at 
the beautiful scenery stretched out before him. Be- 
low, and more immediately near, were the golden 
fields shimmering in the sunlight. .Beyond ran the 
forests, with their deep green foliage, and far out, 
framing all in, were the blue summits of the distant 
mountains, that seemed to melt into the soft summer 
skies. It was hard to realize that in this beautiful, 
peace-loving stretch of nature man's evil nature had 
hidden death in its crudest forms, and over all spread 
the dark pinions of brutal war, dropping mourning 
and desolation on the homes of all the land. 

Our captain had not much poetry in his soul, 
and probably at that moment was thinking of where 
he could fiud some fresh bread and butter, instead of 
side meat and hard-tack, that made his digestion 
suffer at the mere thought. Whatever his thoughts 
may have been, they were interrupted by the guard, 
who, pausing on his weary round, shaded his eyes 
with one hand for a moment, and then cried: 
19 



218 Selected Prose Sketches. 

u I say, Cap, what the devil is that coming down 
the hill yonder?" 

The officer sprang to his feet, and, bringing his 
• glass to bear, had the happiness of a new emotion. 

" What the devil?" he muttered, " it looks like 
a flag of truce. By George, it is a flag! Hullo, 
there ! My horse ! Hurry up, several of you ! 
Mount quick, I say ! " 

It was a flag of truce, and as it approached, the 
captain and his escort had ridden down to meet it. 
The captain was kept from laughing by the novelty 
of the fact. The leader of the cavalcade he met was 
mounted on a switch-tailed hat-rack, with marks of 
collar and traces on its lean body, that added to its 
grotesqueness by the infernal pace, so common to 
Virginia horses, that makes the animal look as if it 
had on each side a separate organization, and har- 
monized the two through a general understanding to 
move one side at a time. The rider was dressed in 
common butternut homespun, turned into a uniform 
by having pieces of red flannel sewed to the shoulders, 
an old-fashioned sword, that had come down through 
no end of militia musters from the revolution, was 
slung to his thin form by a common saddle girth. 
The sallow face was shaded by a broad-brimmed 
slouched hat, that was made conspicuous by a white 
and red cockade, fresh from the barnyard, sporting 



Rumors of the War. 219 

the tails of at least a dozen unfortunate roosters. He 
carried on a stick a dirty white rag, while his two 
companions, or squad, as badly rigged and mounted, 
one on a mare that showed by her uneasiness, that a 
colt had been left behind, were to be known as soldiers 
only by their heavy old muskets. 

Our captain called a halt, and demanded the rea- 
son for this extraordinary appearance. 

" I come, sah," was the response in the purest Po- 
tomac dialect^ " from General Tomkins, to demand 
the immediate surrender of Petersburg." 

" The devil you do," was the captain's brusque 
response. 

"Yes, sah." ■ 

" Will you tell General Tomkins for me that if 
he wants this God-forsaken town, just come and 
take it." 

" Very well, sah ; then General Tomkins ordered 
me to say to you, sah, to remove the women and 
children, for he will open on the place immediately." 

" Tell General Tomkins," snorted the captain, 
" for me, that as the women and children are secesh, 

he can open and be d to him and them, too. The 

more he kills the merrier it will be." 

" General Tomkins is a humane man, sah, and 
despises a war on women and children. To avoid 
unnecessary bloodshed, he demands your surrender." 



220 Selected Prose Sketches, 

"You have my answer — pound away. I won't 
surrender ! " 

" Very well, sah ; I shall so report." 

And, so saying, he gravely saluted our captain, 
and, turning, rode away. As he did so the bereaved 
mare made a vigorous effort by rearing and kicking 
to rid herself of her rider. Failing in this she took 
the bit in her teeth, and went off at a speed highly 
complimentary to the brood mares of Virginia. The 
bearer of the flag and his remaining squad of one 
man paced off in a sober, sedate manner, while the 
rider of the bereaved mother, with his long legs and 
arms flapping wildly, disappeared over the hill as 
Captain Lee and his orderlies made the place ring 
with their peals of laughter. The flag of truce, how- 
ever, did not respond to this merriment. Their mis- 
sion could not be relegated to the things that amuse. 
They carried war and desolation's nakedness back to 
the mysterious General Tomkins. 

Our captain lost no time trotting back to camp. 
He had the long roll beaten, the company hastily 
drawn up in line, supported by such of the sick and 
wounded as could stand. This gallant little force was 
informed that the enemy, under General Tomkins, 
was about to make a raid on Petersburg, that he 
would probably open on them with artillery, and as 
they had none with which to respond, it would be 



Humors of the War. 221 

necessary to assume the offensive as soon as the dem- 
onstration was made. This was responded to by such 
hearty cheers as the honest throats of American 
soldiers — God bless them — are always ready to give, 
and our hero, sitting in grim silence, on his steed, 
awaited further developments. 

An hour passed, and then to the captain's 
amazement the flag of truce again appeared; this 
time without the bereaved mare. Captain Lee rode 
down. 

" General Tomkins, sah," said the flag bearer, " is 
humane — yes, sah — a gallant soldier, sah, but humane. 
He has his guns in position, under a superior force, 
and he again demands a surrender to avoid unneces- 
sary bloodshed, sah." 

" See here," said the captain, " you have my 
answer, and if you come cavorting down this road 
again I'll open on you. Do you understand that? " 

" Yes, sah — a flag of truce, sah." 

" Oh, go to ," well it was a rather warm 

climate, not then abolished by Colonel Ingersoll, and 
our hero rode back to his command. At the head of 
his small forces he awaited the attack. He waited in 
vain. The woods upon the mountains, into which 
the flag of truce had disappeared, remained silent as 
a cemetery. The sun went down, the stars came out, 
and yet the thunder of the threatened artillery failed 



222 Selected Prose Sketches. 

to awakeo the echoes of the mountains; one by one 
the sick and wounded dropped off, and the anxious 
commander, taking all necessary precautions for the 
night, broke ranks and sent his soldiers to their tents. 
The place remained undisturbed through the 
night, and early in the morning a squad of Connecticut 
cavalry — a force always bumming around stealing 
horses, and making themselves generally disagreeable 
to both sides — galloped into camp with some prison- 
ers, and among the rest the bearer of the flag. 

" How d' ye do ?" asked our captain of the war- 
rior under the red flannel straps. 

" Purty well, sah ; how d' ye find yerself ?" 
« Why did n't you open on us yesterday ?" 
" Well, sah, fact is we had no artillery." 
" The devil ! Why did you not come in and take 
us anyhow ?" 

" Why, you see, sah, when you beat the long roll 
and formed, we thought you were too much for us." 
" That so ?" 

" Yes, sah, only three of us all told." 
" Then I have the honor of addressing General 
Tomkins ?" 

" You have, sah." 

It was a neat little game of bluff, in which our 
captain won by a call. 



Churchyard Reveries. 223 



Churchyard Reveries. 

For many clays past I have been engaged superin- 
tending the erection of a vault and monument at the 
old churchyard of Mac-o-chee. 

I call it old, for it was among the first, if not the 
first, God's acre dedicated to the white dead after the 
Indians left their graves, to vanish westwardly into 
tradition. I remember well an Indian burial-place 
that I often visited when a boy under what is now a 
garden to the residence of Mr. John Nash, not 
half a mile from this Catholic cemetery, in which 
I am preparing a place for my dead. The In- 
dians were not given to monuments, and there was 
not much to indicate the graves, or the boundary of 
the lot. I remember well, traces of a trench that old 
George Martin, a pioneer much given to fishing on 
Sunday, and whisky at all times, told me contained 
the bodies of the warriors killed when the Mac-o-chee 
towns were surprised and burned by the white settlers 
from Kentucky. 

I remember, too, the Indians themselves. A rem- 
nant of the Wyandotte tribe lingered about Upper 
Sandusky in my youthful days, and it was no uncom- 






224 Selected Prose^ Sketches. 

mon event for a number of them to visit our settle- 
ment, offering skins and maple sugar for sale. A 
mingled feeling of fear and curiosity held me in their 
presence, and having heard very wild stories of their 
wars, in which Martin figured as a tremendous fellow, 
I hung about the copper-colored sons of the forest 
quite fascinated. 

Cooper, the novelist, has fixed in the American 
mind an impossible Indian, and this silent, brave and 
intensely solemn creation will go down to future ages 
as the Indian our fathers persecuted and destroyed. 

I have come, through much observation and a lit- 
tle thought, to regard national traits as superstitutions. 
Mankind, in the main, is about the same the world 
over. It is an article set on end, with a turn for 
cooking and the capacity to laugh. Some cook better 
than others, and some laugh more readily and louder ; 
but to deny a people a sense of humor, as Cooper did 
the Indian, is as absurd as making a wooden-headed 
saint out of Washington and a fiend incarnate out 
of Burr. 

The Indians from Upper Sandusky, coming 
among us, turned the skins they had to sell into 
whisky, mainly, and became thereafter vociferously 
cheerful. In this condition they kicked the squaws, 
and got slashed over their heads with knives by those 
gentle beings, which treatment brought forth roars 



Churchyard Reveries. 225 

of laughter, which grew hysterical when a mother- 
in-law took a hand in the family disturbance. 

There was among them one old Indian known as 
" Capten Johnny," who would have made a fortune 
as the clown of a circus. He had a way of hoisting 
his heel and kicking himself when disappointed or 
disgusted with himself, and saying, with some em- 
phasis and the gravest face, " Me dam." 

The rough pioneers of the valley were fond of 
retailing old " Capten Johnny's " jokes. One, I re- 
member, quite illustrative of his solemn style, for the 
old fellow never laughed. He was quite struck with 
the intelligence exhibited by a bob-tailed pointer dog ? 
owned by an officer. And the old " Capten," turn- 
ing it over in his aboriginal mind, came to the con- 
clusion that the dog's sagacity, so superior to the 
" Capten's " own hounds, came of the fact that his 
tail had been amputated. Tails, he thought, weak- 
ened the intellect. " Man got no tail — man see good 
— see afore, see 'hind, all good, when no drunk." 

Having arrived at this sage conclusion, the next 
step was to try his theory on one of his own hounds. 
By shortening the tail, he thought to strengthen the 
canine intellect. To this end, he requested a wood- 
man, engaged in hewing a piece of timber, to hold 
across the log the tail of his hound while he cut off 
the appendage with a broad ax. As the heavy ax 



226 Selected Prose Sketches. 

came over with a sweep, the woodman, either alarmed 
or pretending to be, gave the poor dog a jerk, and 
Captain Johnny cut the poor animal in two. Drop- 
ping the ax, he exclaimed solemnly : 

" Hip — by dam — two short a most," and went in 
pursuit of another. 

To return from the dead and almost forgotten 
Indians to the buried whites. St. Elizabeth, of the 
Mac-o-chee, is a rude Catholic burying ground, hold- 
ing the remains of mostly poor folk — so poor that, 
were they not Catholics, there would be few remind- 
ers in the way of monuments, to keep the dead in 
memory. Two or three more pretentious structures 
tell of wealthy or well-to-do families, but the major- 
ity are of those in the humblest walks of life. 

The place is exceedingly beautiful in its sur- 
roundings. Situated on one of the low, softly 
rounded and richly wooded hills that frame in the 
Mad River valley, far off to the west and south the 
eye takes in the wide stretch of fertile plains, with 
streams willow-fringed, and farm houses half hid in 
orchards, until, on the dim horizon, earth seems to 
melt into heaven. "A blue country," as Ruskin calls 
such, and as beautiful a specimen as I ever had the 
happiness to look upon. Off to the right one catches 
the gleam of the village spires that rise above the 



Churchyard Reveries. 227 

beautiful maple-shaded place, and I find myself 
weaving the sounds into the music of words: 

And now, as in that far-off time, 

The village sounds are dear ; 
The cry of children and the chime 

Of bells break on the ear. 
My playmates, then, are bearded men, 

The men tread old, and slow, 
Or sleep within God's silent glen 

Where broods the long ago. 

These, with the clip, clip of the workmen build- 
ing in the warm spring sunlight a house for me and 
mine when we shall have passed away and left noth- 
ing but this vault and monument to hold our name 
in memory, make the voices of solitude. 

How we cling to this hope of a memory. I 
wander, book in hand, among these graves, and note 
the humble records in humble lines. Born so and 
so — died so and so, and then a sentence from the 
Bible. That is all. Brief story of a busy life — a life 
full of hopes and fears, triumphs and disappoint- 
ments. What comedies, what tragedies, with the 
whole world for a stage, have been enacted, for when 
a man is born the world begins, and when the man 
dies the world ends; and how important it all is — for 
each, in his own estimation, is a center, a hub, as it 
were. He can not realize that when, upon some very 



228 Selected Prose Sketches. 

unpleasant proposition, assisted by a doctor, and 
wept over by three or four, he drops out of this life, 
his exit will scarcely be noticed, and all his affairs, to 
which he was so necessary, will go on as if he had 
never existed. 

The last grand struggle for a memory is made in 
the cemetery. He, though dead, asserts himself above 
his grave. Here are the immortal stones, with names 
cut deep into them. Some are leaning over, moss cov- 
ered and gray, as if in extreme old age — and others 
are down, as if fairly exhausted with holding up the 
legend of a name — and all scarcely legible. " Sacred 
to the memory of" — poor man, in all this wide world 
there is not one who remembers, or dimly remember- 
ing, cares for the departed, whose very bones are dust. 

Gray tells us of the mute, inglorious Miltons, lost 
in his country churchyard. Is the Milton who was 
not mute, or Shakespeare, or Caesar, or any of the 
world's great, any more fortunate in that respect than 
these humble toilers ? I think not. Let us see. 

In counting the past we fix in our minds a period, 
at which to begin — we start at the creation. Looking 
forward, we help ourselves to another date known as 
the day of judgment, when the world shall end. We 
ignore the awful truth, that before our date of begin- 
ning, back through the countless millions of ages, 
lies eternity, and before us, through the same count- 



Churchyard Reveries. 229 

less ages going on, and on, and on forever, is the fu- 
ture. Here we are, then, unseen motes in the now, 
taking to ourselves an immortality of fame. Already, 
the blind Homer Is fading in the dim distance, and 
the blind Milton diminishes with passing years. 
Shakespeare will follow, all glittering insects that 
flash for an instant in the sunlight, and then disap- 
pear forever. 

What are crumbling monuments in the light of 
eternity ? They seem solid and slow of decay to us, 
precisely as this atom of a world in the boundless 
space that stretches on and on without limit, with its 
countless worlds, seems to us a huge affair. It is not 
even as a grain of sand upon the shore. 

It is well for us that we are not all Bob Ingersolls, 
and know too much, or rather think we know it all. 
We ate of the tree of knowledge, but neglected to 
steal from the tree of life. We lack the strength, 
then, to entertain our information. When a man 
crawls up beyond traditionary teachings to the edge 
of the world, and stares out upon blank, cold, unend- 
ing space he is stricken with blindness or insanity. 
One can not think truly of God and retain his reason, 
as he can not see God and live, as the Bible tells us. 
Therefore is it that we take refuge in Christ ; the 
sweet, loving, humble Savior, and through His mercy 
enjoy our homes and accept our graves. 



230 Selected Prose Sketches, 

Sitting among these poor graves, with a cross 
over each, erected by loving hands, and covered by 
grass and ground ivy, watered by tears from broken 
hearts, 1 thought what a cruel ceremony was this bu- 
rial of the dead, without the consolation Christ's relig- 
ion gives. And how brutal are the men who go about 
striving to destroy this comfort. 

It is, on this account, I have no patience with our 
Colonel Ingersoll. Of course, he is powerless among 
the better educated, the thoughtful minds that hold 
Christ's religion as not only perfect, but precious. It 
is with the ignorant, the poor, who have no opportu- 
nity for study, no time for thought, that the wrong is 
being done. 

Through all time, the more fortunate class, the rich 
and well born, have had their religion born of the 
brain, rather cold and uncomfortable, but nevertheless 
a faith to lean upon. The great mass of earth's toil- 
ers had no such consolation until Christ appeared on 
earth, and became the friend of the oppressed and 
downtrodden, the teacher of the great untaught. 

Like Moses of old, He smote with His rod of truth 
the hard, flinty earth, and from its rocky heart sprang 
into light and life the waters of God's religion, not 
for the rich and well born, to fill their silver pitchers 
and relieve their delicate thirst, but to flow along in 
lowly places over the earth, where the poor and suffer- 



Churchyard Reveries. 231 

ing may stoop and drink, and go their way strength- 
ened and happy. 

I heard Colonel Ingersoll on one occasion, and I 
langhed,not so mnch at his humor, which is great, as 
at the man. To see a stout gentleman, in a swallow- 
tailed coat and white choker, prancing up and down 
a stage on a Sunday night, assailing Moses, struck me 
as extremely ludicrous. The theater was crowded by, 
I should say, some two thousand men, and of the two 
thousand one solitary individual had read Moses, and 
that was the fleshy gentleman engaged in assailing 
him. I thought of Sidney Smith's irreverent man 
who spoke disrespectfully of the equator. 

I never saw illustrated before the hold Christi- 
anity has taken on the popular mind. Colonel Inger- 
soll could ridicule Moses, he could even express his 
doubts as to God, but a slight allusion to our Savior 
was followed by a dead silence, that indicated that 
any attempt at ridicule or abuse in that direction 
would shock even this hardened, shallow, indifferent 
crowd. The friend of the poor, the afflicted and op- 
pressed, who died teaching us that the road to Heaven 
was through kindness to each other — " Glory to God 
on high and peace and good will to men on earth" — 
holds His own in the hearts of humanity, even in the 
hell of a theater, with a theological end-man raising 
a laugh at the expense of Moses. 



232 Selected Prose Sketches. 

This gentleman claims to know all about every- 
thing, and yet, when on this occasion, he asked him- 
self whether he believed in an existence after death, 
he said he did not know. I do not claim to be clever, 
and never sought to instruct any one, and yet, had 
Colonel Ingersoll been asked, " Do you believe you 
exist now?" he would have considered the questioner 
a fool. And yet, both beliefs rest on the same foun- 
dation. This thing we call " I," " me," " myself," 
that thinks, wills and remembers, believes, feels, 
knows that it exists. It feels, knows and believes that 
we existed yesterday and will exist to-morrow, and 
forever. It is as easy to make us comprehend anni- 
hilation as it is to convince us that we do not exist. 
I have heard divines spend hours, in far-fetched argu- 
ments and questionable facts to prove the immortality 
of the soul, when each soul within hearing felt its ex- 
istence, and could not, by any process of reasoning, 
be brought to comprehend non-existence — or an- 
nihilation. 

Sitting alone amid these neglected graves of the 
poor, I read the great truth on every weather-stained, 
moss-obscured tombstone about me. The untaught 
toilers of the earth have put briefly and in quaint 
words their unshaken faith to record. In the Indian 
burying ground, not far off, is the same faith. And 
on no part of the earth can a man be found who is not 



Churchyard Reveries. 233 

born with that consciousness, that belief, in him. 
Why then waste time in proving a fact, that only puz- 
zles one when an attempt is made to disprove it ? 

Again, if this little life of ours here be all and 
end all of existence, death would be as easy and nat- 
ural to us as sleep. But, as we are born into this 
world in a painful strife — we are born into that other 
existence in a struggle. Pain comes, and pain goes 
with us. There is no preparation we can make that 
will familiarize us with the dreaded change. The old 
man, with two-thirds of his physical being already 
buried, looks forward to interests in this life as keenly 
as the young. 

All men are mortal save the man himself, says 
the poet. We never take death into our confidence. 
I look at the narrow cell in this vault I have selected 
for myself, and try to realize my mortal remains be- 
ing shoved in and walled up, when the hand that 
writes this and the body I have so long regarded as 
" me " shall be left there, in darkness, to moulder in 
decay. But I can not bring it home to a palpable, fa- 
miliar sense. I know that in a brief period — Oh ! so 
brief — I shall be taken down on some unpleasant medi- 
cated proposition, and get worse and weaker from 
day to day, when at last a cry of anguish will go up 
from the one dear being — the one, the only one in all 
this world who truly believes in me — and the neigh- 
20 



234 Selected Prose Sketches. 

bors will gather in with very long faces, and much 
seemly solemnity and no grief, and then follow the 
hearse, while talking of the weather and the crops, to 
this, my final home on earth. But I can not make it 
familiar — nor pleasant. 

This musing, in the still solitude of a neglected 
graveyard is all well enough, but for myself to afford 
food for worms and meditation is not so agreeable ! 

I was once making excellent time from Bull 
Pasture mountain, in Virginia, during the war, when 
we had been defeated by the Confederates, with the 
late Colonel Crane, when that gallant officer turned 
to me and said : 

" I don't want you to suppose, Donn, that I am 
scared. I am not. But, my dear fellow, you don't 
know what a singular prejudice I have against dying 
just at this time." 

And what a mockery is the funeral ! If the pro- 
cession were reduced to the actual mourners, one hack 
would carry it all. Lucky is the man who can fill 
one hack. I have a seat vacant now in mine. 



The World's Grumblers. 235 



The World's Gfambleps. 

The threatened return of the cholera to our af- 
flicted land reminds me of a man I once knew who 
improved the occasion of a visit from that awful 
scourge to develop a trait peculiar to a class given to 
not only looking upon the dark side of all events, 
hut forcing others to occupy the same standpoint. 

This world of ours has "been likened to a vale of 
tears and a valley of tribulation. We come into it 
with a cry, live through it in sorrow, and go out with 
a howl of anguish, not only on the part of the poor 
actor making his exit, but all the sorrowing friends 
and relatives join in the lamentations. 

One would suppose that under this state of mel- 
ancholy fact, the dictates of duty, and no less philos- 
ophy, would teach us to make the best of it, and so 
train our thoughts and cultivate our conduct as to see 
and feel the few blessings bestowed upon us. 

This is the fact with a majority, and I believe we 
would get along quite comfortably were it not for a 
class of grumblers who go about growling at all 
things, and not content with feeling miserably them- 
selves, insist on everybody else sharing in their stupid 
wretchedness. The poet Rogers sang : 



236 Selected Prose Sketches. 

" Such joys I find in melancholy, 
I would not if I could be gay." 

Sweet musical words, but a cursedly mean senti- 
ment when it finds expression in vulgar discontent. 

Our salutation, when we meet, is "How are 
you ?" The response should be " Jolly, I thank you ; 
hope you enjoy the same blessing." This is seldom 
the response. The party of the first part and the 
party of the second part immediately fall into a de- 
tailed account of his or her bodily ills; If talks about 
our aches and pains were suppressed, two-thirds of 
the conversation of civilized life would cease. If to 
this interdicted subject be added the weather, hu- 
manity would relapse into brute silence. I forgot 
that female discourse on dress and servants would yet 
remain and the chattering continue. 

It is amazing to listen and hear-humanity, set on 
end for some wise purpose, devoting so much of the 
brief time allotted us on earth to a careful detailed 
diagnosis of head aches, back aches, stomach aches, 
and that peculiar misery that defies description. Ac- 
companying this are the cases, kind and unkind, that 
have been found available or suggested by friends 
once in their time afflicted in the same way. 

I think this might be improved on if, instead of 
seizing each other by the hand, and vibrating the 



The World's Grumblers. 237 

arm, like a pump-handle, a most senseless ceremony, 
each should seize the pulse of the other, and proceed 
to count the same with running comments, more or 
less discouraging. After this, these tailless monkeys 
should thrust out their tongues, and have the coats 
of the same investigated and reported on. 

The comical part of this business lies in the pa- 
tience with which each listens to the other. He or 
she knows, however, that his or her turn comes next, 
and the luxury of unloading sickening accounts of 
sickness will be granted. 

The thought has often struck me that the great 
foundation stone of the Catholic religion is to be 
found in the confessional. This not only relieves one 
of his sins and makes the poor clergyman better ac- 
quainted with the wants and weaknesses of his con- 
gregation, but it is such a luxury to be able to talk 
of oneself without the penalty of having the recipi- 
ent talk back on the same bore of a subject. 

Once upon a time I tried this infliction. I did 
not assume the garb of a priest, and sit on a hard 
seat within the reach of a bad breath. I was not ca- 
pable of that torture, but while passing the summer 
at Berkeley Springs, Va., I encountered a homeopathic 
specimen of manhood in the shape of a little poet. 

He carried his so-called poems about him and per- 
sisted in reading them to every one he could corner for 



238 Selected Prose Sketches. 

that purpose. I never could bear that jingle of two 
words at the end of an idea, unless I wrote them my- 
self, and the guests at Berkeley were of the same turn. 
They fled from the approach of this nuisance on legs, 
as if he had been the cholera. 

I saw the poor fellow wandering about in such a 
melancholy manner, with his eyes that had all the in- 
tensity of a pickled shad, in search of a victim, and I 
said, "Medicated scientists have risked their lives in 
experiments made to benefit humanity, why should I 
not take the same risk ? Why not test my powers of 
endurance? I am a journalist. Patient endurance 
is a great quality for success in that pursuit." I did 
not make any will, for I had nothing to leave, nor 
did I fortify myself with old Virginia whisky. I 
took a sad, lingering look at the purple hued moun- 
tains, the bright sunlight, and a receipted board bill, 
and had Otway Randolph Gnat read me his much 
renowned poem on Berkeley. 

How readily, with what joy, he took the roll of 
MS. from his bosom, and began reading before wo 
could reach the shade. 

It was one of those exasperating doggerels, 
abounding in rhymes and puns, that makes the im- 
pression on one of an uncertain stream trickled down 
one's back. It was a regular treadmill, where, tramp 
as lively as you may, you never get on or up. The 



The World's Grumblers. 239 

moments seemed hours and hours ages of torture. 
I felt the over-excited brain gathering the blood 
of my body to my head. A dreadful pain set in. I 
felt that life was in danger, but I could not stop. 
It was like those dreadful scribblings on walls that 
one sometimes encounters, and one must read, al- 
though reading is disquiet. 

Otway Randolph Gnat came to the end at last. 
"Now is the time for heroic courage," I thought; 
and I said — may the Lord forgive me for lying ! — 
" Otway, my boy, that is exquisite! I am delighted. 
I can not part from it. Would you mind going over 
and culling such passages as you may think the 
finest?" 

He read it all over again. 

I seized the awful MS., and cried : " Otway, I 
must read this to my friends ! " I fled in a dazed 
condition to my room. For days I was ill, and at 
times delirious. I drove my sorrowing friends from 
me by shouting : "Ah ha ! is n't this beautiful ? " and 
pouring out a torrent of doggerel that my fevered 
brain had caught up and retained. 

The experience was, however, of great benefit 
to me. I found after that I could listen to a so- 
called debate in the senate without flinching, and to 
this day I can listen to a detailed account of all the 
ills my every acquaintance seems troubled with, and 



240 Selected Prose Sketches. 

not only save him or her from the penalty of a re- 
turn diagnosis, but retain a look of deep interest that 
has won for me the reputation of the most fascinat- 
ing conversationalist alive. 

A friend told me of a stout, ill-tempered Irish- 
woman in the car who had a poor, forlorn-looking 
female seat herself beside her. The unhappy creat- 
ure began pouring into the ears of newly-found lis- 
teners her misfortunes in the way of family sickness. 
The Irishwoman bore the infliction for some time in 
silence, and then almost annihilated the mournful 
talker by asking fiercely : 

" Phat in the blank is all yer blankety blank 
throubles to me, ye ould idjiot ! " 

It would not be polite to sit down on every 
grumbler in that way, and yet the nauseous details 
of one's sickness is about as rude as such a snub 
would be. 

What I sat down to write, however, was of a 
melancholy man who read the cholera reports and 
repeated them to all his acquaintances and patients, 
for he was a physician. He was the most learned 
fool in that line I ever knew. Strange infatuation 
people have, that to cultivate the memory betters the 
judgment, when the fact is the better the memory 
the poorer the intellect. 

Dr. Aberuthy Snyder had a most tenacious mem- 



The World's Grumblers. 241 

ory. We called him Old Statistics, from a habit he 
had of remembering the figures and forgetting the 
facts. He had a way of saying to one abruptly : 
" Do you know what happened on this day three 
hundred years ago ? " The response would be, of 
course, in the negative. " Well, sir, I am astonished; 
yes, sir, astonished; the ignorance of some people is 
annoying. This day precisely three hundred years 
ago General Pillicoddy crossed the Po and changed 
the face of Europe." 

When the cholera broke out among us, Old Sta- 
tistics was in his element. With a face and a man- 
ner that made him a condensed funeral, he went 
about with a history of every plague that ever de- 
stroyed humanity on the tip of his tongue, and he 
created a panic at every turn. It was on cholera re- 
ports, however, that he was most effective. Coming 
down to breakfast at our boarding-house, he would 
solemnly announce: a One hundred and ten cases 
and ninety deaths within the last twenty-four hours — 
awful ! awful ! The dread disease is on us. It is 
the Asiatic cholera in the most malignant form." 

" Has medicine no remedy, doctor?" would ask 
a female boarder, frightened into a subdued condi- 
tion of ready-to-take-any-thing-that-moment. 

" No, madame ; pained to say no. Calomel 

21 



242 Selected Prose Sketches. 

guarded with opium, or opium stimulated with calo- 
mel, seems to be the only medicine — but in vain." 

" Why, doctor ? " 

" Well, madame, it takes calomel eight hours to 
affect the liver ; the patient dies in four." 

" Why do you call it a remedy, then ? " growled 
an old bald-headed, bottle-nosed boarder. 

" Because, in very mild cases, sir, the patient es- 
capes cholera, and dies of inflammation of the bow- 
els — or brain, sir, if he happens to have one, which, 
I am sorry to say, is seldom the case." 

" What can we do, doctor, to avoid this dreadful 
scourge ? " 

" Medicine is at fault. We can only warn you 
to be careful of your diet." This was a signal for 
general consternation, for he would continue : " We 
only know that it is a disease of the bowels, and 
whether caused by the food we eat, or aggravated by 
such, the fact remains that the stomach is affected. 
Don't touch cowcumbers, or you perish. If you 
want to die immediately, eat hash. Preserves and 
pickles are poison. If any man hankers after the 
worst and most malignant form of Asiatic cholera, 
let him eat bread pudding. Fruit is fatal. Hot bread 
in any shape is death. Pork, sir, pork ! Bless my 
soul, what a question ! One sausage is good for four 



The World's Grumblers. 243 

" What in the devil is a man to eat ? " snorted 
the bald-headed boarder. 

"Rice, sir, rice — boiled well in water. Nature 
planted the food by the disease. It came from the 
rice swamps of India, and nothing saved the millions 
that survived but the rice. It is nutritive, and of 
easy digestion." 

" Well, I believe I'd rather have the cholera. 
Another sausage, madam," said the bald-headed 
boarder, firmiy. 

" Go on, sir, go on. That is what the grocer 
Green did, round the corner, sir. Eat heartily of 
sausage and tripe at breakfast. Went to his grocery. 
An hour after boy came in to purchase six cents 
worth of cheese. Could not see the grocer — store 
empty of grocer. Boy stole raisins, candy, ginger 
snaps and things. At last boy climbed on counter 
and looked over. There, sir, lay the grocer Green — 
dead, sir, dead in four hours, as you will be if you eat 
more of that sausage." 

The bald-headed man did die that day — of apo- 
plexy. Our doctor said he did it purposely, that he 
might give the lie to his prophecy. 

After breakfast the doctor would stalk down 
town, paper in hand, and to each acquaintance met 
on the way he would foretell an increase of the pesti- 



244 Selected Prose Sketches. 

lence, until his pathway could be traced by the wild 
and scared faces he left behind. 

The mortality among the doctor's patients, 
friends, and especially at our boarding house, was 
frightful. That the animated gloom survived only 
shows the mysterious ways of divine providence. 



The Shaw in London. 245 



The Shaui in London. 

It is the policy of the English government to 
fetch barbarian princes to London as we cart Indians 
over a continent to Washington, that they may be 
awed by the power of the people that has conquered 
them. While the captured potentates are in the daze 
consequent on strange sights and strong liquors, treat- 
ies are made highly advantageous to the civilized 
party, of the first part, and damaging to the untu- 
tored party, of the second part. 

I doubt whether this policy is of much avail to 
the governments practicing it. As we descend the 
scale of intelligence, we find a corresponding ascent 
in cunning. In the end, civilized diplomacy finds 
itself outwitted in the most humiliating way. The 
savages wined and dined — escorted to and fro, like 
"Brer Eabit's tah-baby, say nothin," but they have 
their own views all the same, and take in all the good 
things with a pretty clear conclusion as to the pur- 
pose, that is not complimentary to the entertainment. 

Said a chief once, at Washington, " Great father, 
big chief, much fighters, big guns, way out — no good 
then — whip 'em all time." 

When General Manypenny, of Ohio, was Indian 



246 Selected Prose Sketches. 

commissioner he had the strange belief that Indians 
were human beings, and sought to civilize them 
through cooking stoves and kind treatment. He was 
defeated by border ruffians. The borders are made 
up of criminals escaping conviction and convicts 
escaping punishment. They steal from the Indians 
to sell to the whites, and from the whites to sell to 
the Indians. When they trade their medium of 
exchange is bad whisky, that does not make a man 
drunk, it makes him insane. 

I remember Mannypenny brought on a delega- 
tion of Indians from the then far West. They were 
guileless children of the plains. '> The first tunnel 
they were plunged in on the Baltimore and Ohio 
Railroad, they drew their knives and uttered the 
most fearful yells. On emerging into daylight, 
the women on the train were observed clasping with 
both hands their back hair with an expression of 
mingled fear and resolution comical to contemplate. 

At Washington they were quartered in a hotel. 
The day after the proprietor of that ornate indiges- 
tion remonstrated. He told the commissioner that 
those Indians were beasts, and never left their rooms 
save for the purpose of running down the chamber- 
maids, and robbing them of their false hair, and 
otherwise abusing those foolish virgins. 

The commissioner repaired to the hotel, and 



The Shaw in London. 247 

gave the heads of the nation, through their in- 
terpreter, a long, solemn discourse on the usages of 
civilized society at that hotel. 

The next day the wards got drunk and threw 
the servants, male and female, from the front win-, 
dows. Fortunately, the awnings below saved the 
poor creatures from severe harm. Brown called in 
the police, rallied his boarders, and drove the children 
of the plains to the street. The commissioner 
gathered the delegation together, and quartered them 
in boarding houses. 

The Indians were at first delighted with their 
quarters, but soon learned that a Washington board- 
ing house was a portion of that punishment awarded 
the wicked hereafter. Mrs. Surratt was hanged by a 
court martial for keeping a Washington boarding 
house. At least I never could find on what else the 
poor woman was convicted. 

The day came when these wards w^ere to take 
leave of their great father, and depart for their home 
upon the plains. They were all ill, and walked with 
difficulty into the presence of the president. The 
usual speeches were made, and the Indians lingered. 
It was evident they had more to say. The interpreter 
shook his head at them. He positively declined to 
say it. At last a chief stepped forward, pointing ma- 



248 Selected Prose Sketches. 

jestically io the president, and then with scorn at the 
commission, said : 

" Big father, little father, be dam." 

Then, with a deep grunt of satisfaction, they all 
moved off. 

I happened at London when that ignorant, 
brutal, vulgar barbarian, the Shah of Persia, was be- 
ing ovated by designing English politicians and their 
snobbish followers. I did not take much interest in 
the Persian fellow. The polygamous potentate of 
Persia was to all save England, that had designs on 
him and his provinces, a very limited production of 
far less interest to me than Private Dalzell, Eli 
Perkins, or Ward and Grant. I, however, heard 
some stories about the clubs that were somewhat 
amusing. 

I learned that all the precious jewels 'with which 
his royal person was covered, were false stones bought 
of the house of bondage, run by Moses & Sons, pawn- 
brokers. 

The most entertaining, however, was a story of 
how His Royal Scorbutic Majesty fell in love with 
the ballet of the opera. He loved all the ballet, for 
the heart of your Persian monarch is a sort of an 
omnibus, and always has room for a few more. 
After each performance this son of the sun and 
brother of the moon, would pace to and fro rubbing 



The Shaw in London. 249 

his royal hands, and between Persian cries of delight, 
call all his divinities to witness, that he had never 
seen such ravishing forms — the art of manufacturing 
legs for public exhibition had not yet reached Persia 
— nor such rapturous jumping. He sent his prime 
minister and barber, with a proposition to the ballet. 
It was to add the entire corps to his seraglio. The 
gay young troop treated the proposition with con- 
tempt. Why, each one had a little seraglio of her 
own, and, besides, they all were under contract with 
their manager, and there would be the mischief to 
pay if that were broken ; for each member believed, 
in her terpsichorean heart, that she was the bright 
particular star of the troupe, and anon jealous con- 
spiracies would give way and she beam out as a star. 
One little girl, however, and the brightest of all, 
lent a willing ear to the proposal. Her real name 
was Susan Powers, but she wrote it Susette Violanti. 
This little blonde drove a contract with the tonsorial 
minister to the effect that his master was to deposit 
£5,000 in the Bank of London to her account, and 
added several stipulations such as suggest themselves 
to the common ballet mind. The preliminaries being 
complete, the ballet dancer was summoned to appear 
before the Persian monarch, at the palatial residence 
assigned him by the British government, when it'ap- 
peared that this honored guest from the land of 



250 Selected Prose Sketches. 

poetry and dreams wished to be entertained in his 
hours of retirement by a dance. 

"But, your Majesty," cried Susette, " lean not 
dance without music." 

" Music ! " responded the royal animated show- 
case of paste diamond. " Music, of course not, go at 
once and get some music." 

The officious official rushed to the street and 
captured an astonished hand-organ and monkey. 

" That is not music, your Majesty," laughed Su- 
sette, merrily, "that is a dreadful noise." 

" Noise !" asked the royal brother of the moon 
and light of all Persia, " what's the difference?" 

Susette explained. She wanted certain instru- 
ments, an orchestra, in a word, and immediately 
some of his majesty's suite were detailed as such, and 
while the instruments were being procured, the pos- 
sessor of fifty paste Koh-i-noors smoked and mused 
upon the strange results of western civilization as 
developed in legs and motion. 

When the instruments and improvised musicians 
were brought together, and the order given to play, 
the noise was more horrible than the hand organ. 
Little Susette struck her delicate fingers in her deli- 
cate ears and screamed. The beguiled Shah was 
more puzzled than before, and when told that his 
subjects could not produce the required music, he 



The Shaw in London. 251 

made a few remarks of a personal nature in his native 
tongue, that caused even the swarthy faces of his 
faithful followers to pale. He adjourned the per- 
formance for a prize-fight, gotten up for his enter- 
tainment between a noted peer of the realm and a 
noted prize -fighter. The alarmed vizier consulted 
Susctte. 

" What can I do ?" he cried in despair. " His 
Majesty threatens to bow-string us all." 

" Send for our director," said Susette, " He '11 ham- 
mer the noise out of those fellows if you pay him 
enough." 

The director was sent for. All musical directors 
have dirty nails, take snuff, and are ill-tempered. 
Between pinches, this potentate of the opera studied 
the situation. 

" T can furnish His Majesty with a very good or- 
chestra of my own," he said. 

" But will they go to Persia?" 

" They will go to the devil, if you pay them." 

" And be his subjects, liable to the bow string ?•" 

" Certainly, with a liberal allowance of beer and 
tobacco." 

" But His Majesty has given his order, He does not 
permit his orders to be questioned or changed." 

The director took huge pinches of snuff. He 
could not solve the difficulty. 



252 Selected Prose Sketches. 

" Musicians," he said, "are not made; they are 
born. Adam, a man, was created in one day; a first 
violin is the result of many generations. His Ma- 
jesty's orders are impossible." 

" Perhaps so," replied the poor vizier ; " that is our 
system of government. The Shah is born to a right 
to try the impossible, we are born to suffer from the 
failure. You can have your own price for the effort, 
and my head if you fail." 

A compromise was agreed on. The director was 
to furnish musicians of his own while instructing the 
barbarians. 

" Can I wallop them ?" he asked. 

" Undoubtedly." 

" That is something. It won't help on the music, 
but it will relieve my feelings !" 

The music was procured and the sovereign of Per- 
sia made happy in a little ballet of his own. The or- 
chestra to be gotten up out of Persians, as the 
director prophesied, did not prosper. By the time 
the Shah reached Paris, the first and second violins 
had disappeared. They were subsequently arrested 
by the police of London, striving to make a precari- 
ous living as musicians, and sentenced to hard labor 
as nuisances. The trombone committed suicide, 
while the bass viol and clarionet were in a hopeless 
state of idiocy. The drum alone remained of a 



The Shaw in London. 253 

sound mind and sound execution. But one can't 
have an orchestra out of a drum, and so the attempt 
was abandoned. The regular orchestra performers, 
however, were happy, content, and quite willing to 
go to Persia or the devil, as the director had said, upon 
reasonable pay and unlimited tobacco and beer. 

Susette grew in favor, and, without doubt, Persia 
would have had an English queen but for the un- 
happy fact that at Paris the Shah succeeded in adding 
two French performers to his troupe. 

In the first performance thereafter, Susette saw, 
or thought she saw, her eastern master bestowing too 
much favor on the newcomers, who really threw their 
shapely legs — I beg pardon, limbs — much higher than 
she, and, stung by jealous wrath, the plucky little 
Susette planted a succession of right and left blows, 
and sundry kicks on the persons of her rivals that 
were more vigorous than graceful. The French ral- 
lied and a general engagement came off. 

For awhile the Shah labored under the delusion 
that this was part of the ballet, and enjoyed it hugely, 
but when he saw that two-thirds of his troupe had 
black eyes and bloody noses, while Susette's lovely 
countenance resembled a colored railroad map of 
England, the truth dawned on his eastern intellect 
that he was being treated to a revolt of the harem, 
and calling in his eunuchs, he immediately ordered 



254 Selected Prose Sketches. 

the bow-string for the entire troupe. It called out 
the full force of European diplomacy to save the 
politest capita] of the civilized world the scandal of 
such an execution. It put an end, however, to the 
Shah's private ballet. 

What a shame that these writers of comic opera 
should cudgel their dull brains for plots when such a 
charming story as this exists in fact. 



Our Inventive Cranks. 255 



Ow Inventive Cranks. 

Who has not met, at unpleasant frequency in life, 
a pale, slender, sunken- eyed and seedy man, who in- 
vents ? Who is there has not wished himself dead, or 
the inventor in hades, on such occasions? 

Conquering a continent with a scarcity of labor- 
ers has developed our ingenuity to a point of insanity. 
Our patent office at Washington is packed with de- 
vices of stranded cunning. The law of our being 
holds good, and for one success we have a thousand 
failures. 

The late war was fought to a successful conclu- 
sion, not alone by bayonets and artillery, but by 
agricultural implements, that enabled the North to 
produce all upon which we lived at home, while it 
sustained a million of men at the front and another 
million swindling the government in the rear. 

We look about us and find ourselves hedged in 
by inventions. The revolving chair I sit in, the table 
I write at, the portable book-stand, the pen, the ink, 
the paper, in a word, every article I use comes from 
the brain of invention, and is stamped as patented by 
the government. 

Yesterday my dentist inserted a buzz saw in my 



256 Selected Prose Sketches. 

grinder and, working a treadle with his right foot, 
made me wish I were dead. 

" Where, in the name of Satan, did you get that 
instrument of torture?" I cried, with my few remain- 
ing teeth on edge, and my poor nerves tingling in 
anguish. 

" It was invented by a farmer to shear sheep," 
he responded, " and failing at that was picked up by 
a dentist." 

The sheep escaped, to have the torture bestowed 
on less fortunate humanity. 

I witnessed once a farce at the Palais Royal, 
Paris, when the fun turned on an exhibit of inven- 
tions, rejected by the Imperial Commission selected 
to pass upon machines, offered the grand international 
exhibition. I remember one instrument, designed to 
open oysters, that filled the entire stage with its com- 
plicated cog-wheels and levers. Another was called 
Chastity's belt, and consisted of concealed daggers 
about the waist of the unprotected female, that flew 
out like a cheval defrise on touching a spring. 

" Very ingenious, indeed," said an old spectator, 
" but I would like to know who controls the spring. 
Monsieur, my wife might spring it on me." 

This was taken as a most reasonable objection by 
the audience that broke into a roar of laughter and 
applause. 



Oar Inventive Cranks. p 257 

It was about that time that an old American 
crank appeared at Paris, by the name of Thompson, 
who proposed to make every article of furniture in a 
ship, life preserving, in case of wreck. His greatest 
invention was a life preserver in the shape of a stool. 
The male passenger was to strap this stool to that 
part of his person where the legs end and the body 
begins. Each stool was warranted to float one hun- 
dred and eighty pounds, so that when the ship went 
down the voyager would float out to sea in a sitting 
position. The female was to be supplied with an 
India-rubber air-tight bustle that would serve the 
same floating purpose. 

Thompson caught the emperor at Charburg go- 
ing through a view of the French fleets, and with a 
life-preserving stool strapped to his inventive person — 
Thompson I mean, not the emperor — jumped over- 
board in a rough sea. 

Little Louis was prejudiced in favor of life- 
preservers at the time, and he presented the indomit- 
able Thompson with a snuff box adorned with 
little Louis' intellectual countenance, set in diamonds. 
Thompson, of the life-stool, went to taking snuff, and, 
it is to be hoped, shortened his inventive life in that 
way. 

The most amusing instance, however, that came 

to my knowledge was in the shape of a Yankee pos- 
22 



258 Selected Prose Sketches. 

sessed of a sewing machine, then just invented. He 
managed, as a Yankee will, to get an interview with 
the Emperor, and told that imperial sham that he 
could teach him in ten minutes to make a pair of 
pantaloons in twenty minutes. 

The cost of a French soldier had been reduced to 
five sous a day. If each soldier could be taught to 
make his own breeches, the cost would be yet further 
reduced. The Emperor tried his hand at breeches- 
making, and succeeded. The Yankee sold his patent 
for a good round sum in cash, and was far at sea 
when the war department of France discovered that 
the nether garment, made in twenty minutes, lasted 
about ten. The knot subsequently invented, was 
then unknown. A break in the thread raveled the 
seam. 

It was after the Emperor had been taught by 
experience to regard Yankee ingenuity in its true 
light that an inventor appeared at Paris on his way 
to St. Petersburg. He had discovered the process of 
rifling cannon and applying to heavy ordnance the 
principle of the minnie-ball. Armed with letters from 
the Russian minister, at Washington, he was on his 
way to St. Petersburg to offer the Russian govern- 
ment the use of his invention. He was bearer of dis- 
patches from our State Department, and, as secretary 
of legation, I helped him on. 



Our Inventive Cranks. 259 

The Crimean war, however, was in progress, and 
travel to St. Petersburg was dangerous and trouble- 
some. Our inventor grew discouraged and returned 
to Paris. With that impartiality peculiar to our peo- 
ple, he concluded that French money was as good as 
Eussian, and wished to offer his invention to France. 
I told him the Emperor, through sad experience, had 
come to be rather shy of Yankee inventors. My 
friend persisted. An idea struck me. I said : " Re- 
turn to your lodgings, take out your invention and 
fire it up the chimney, especially at midnight." 

The good fellow, without seeing my object, did 
as I directed, and in twenty-four hours was arrested 
as a conspirator and thrown into prison. I hastened 
to the Minister of Foreign Affairs. I told him that 
an ingenious American, who had discovered the art 
of applying to artillery the principle of the minnie- 
projectile, and on his way to St. Petersburg under 
endorsement from the Russian minister, at Washing- 
ton, to offer his great invention to the Czar, had been 
arrested as a conspirator. 

The minister was extremely interested. I had 
not only an order for the immediate release of my 
countryman, but in twenty-four hours a commission 
of experts to test the invention. I shall believe to 
my dying day that the French fellows stole Roo- 



260 Selected Prose Sketches. 

sould's invention for the better improvement of 
artillery. 

Be that as it may, Roosould has himself to blame. 
He could not be induced to stick to his great inven- 
tion. He had a thousand. His busy brain teemed 
with a million. The one important commission that 
never reported, but as I believed used the discovery, 
was followed by half a dozen others on all sorts of 
projects. 

One of these, and quite entertaining, was a 
repeater, in the shape of a musket, that was to carry 
forty loads, one on the top of the other. The soldier 
in the quiet of his camp, was to load his musket for 
the next action. The first charge exploded, fired the 
next, and so down to the last. 

The report on this made solemnly by the com- 
mission, gave me a laugh of an hour's duration by the 
clock. It was to the effect that while the invention 
was extremely ingenious, and at first sight seemed 
valuable, a little reflection led to the conclusion that 
the proposed repeater was impracticable. At long 
range, for instance, it would have short charges. As 
the distance lessened, the range would grow long. 
Again were a soldier, armed with this repeater, to be 
wounded or killed, his musket would continue dis- 
charging, and probably with injurious effect to his 
own comrades. In case of a panic, where arms were 



Our Inventive Cranks. 261 

thrown away by flying troops, their flight would be 
hastened or ended by bullets from their own muskets. 

It is scarcely necessary to say that the repeater 
was not adopted by the French government. 

The report, made in dead earnest, reminded me of 
Squibobs, our first humorist, on the effort made to 
create a flying artillery, by strapping mountain how- 
itzers to the backs of mules. There was no question, 
the report said, that in the celerity of movement 
great progress had been obtained. The practical ad- 
vantage gained, however, in action was not so clear. 
The natural disposition of the mule to kick rendered 
loading extremely difficult and accuracy of aim quite 
impossible. 

Again, while it was quite natural for a mule to 
turn his rump to the enemy, it was impossible to 
make the animal comprehend on which side the en- 
emy was. 

In the only action had, the lieutenant continued, 
in which the experiment had been tried, the firing 
was very promiscuous, both as to time and aim, the 
mountain howitzers being sowed in a disorderly man- 
ner, shooting into their own forces as much as at the 
foe. While the enemy fled, in much disorder, some 
twenty miles, the lieutenant's force could never be 
found again. It was his grave conclusion that it had 



262 Selected Prose Sketches. 

been kicked to pieces by the mule and mounted 
howitzers. 

My mind has been turned in this direction by the 
experience of a guest — a most ingenious gentleman, 
of an inventive turn, who came to pass some weeks 
with with me at Mac-o-chee. He came loaded down 
with inventions gotten up more for his personal com- 
fort than with an idea of profit. 

Among these was " "Walcutt's patent bed cooler 
and mosquito guard," which consisted of a huge fan 
suspended above the bed, so worked by cunning ma- 
chinery that the weight of the occupant kept it mov- 
ing for ten hours. As we are without mosquitos at 
Mac-o-chee and the nights are so cool that we sleep 
under blankts, I told him that it was scarcely neces- 
sary to set up his invaluable invention. 

He persisted, and at the dead hour of midnight 
the household was startled by a crash, followed by 
yells such as have not been heard since the Indians 
left. 

These awful noises came from my inventive 
guest's apartment, and seizing a light and a revolver 
I hastened thither. I found the door locked, and as 
the frightful noise continued I threw myself against 
it, breaking it open, and was met by a volley from a 
revolver that knocked the candle from my hand and 
sent bullets whizzing by me. Believing that burglars, 



Our Inventive Cranks. 263 

bent on murder, were within I emptied my revolver 
promiscuously in the dark, and that had the effect of 
redoubling the cries. 

Our guests arrived with lights and we found no 
burglars about, but our friend on the bed under a 
mass of ruins. It seems that he had been startled 
from a dream of murder, and rising confused had 
been hit by his fan, and blindly resisting the blow, 
had gone into a general engagement with his own 
machinery. The revolver I had encountered was an- 
other ingenious contrivance, fastened to the door to 
repel burglars. 

My friend is altogether in a bad way, with a 
broken arm, black eyes, and bruised shins, while I 
and my other guests have an able-bodied and pious 
clergyman returning thanks for our escape from im- 
mediate death. 



264 Selected Prose Sketches. 



Prorogation of Parliament, 

We put ourselves under the diplomatic shadow 
of our minister to witness the process by which Her 
Gracious Majesty the Queen can rid herself and the 
country of her Parliament and enjoy her little estate 
at Osborne, her brown stout and stout Brown in 
peace. Since, dead is Brown, but to memory dear. 
"We had no idea that this proroguing was such a 
troublesome, tedious business. It bothers Her Gra- 
cious Majesty and old Gladstone, now in feeble polit- 
ical and physical strength, to get clear of their Par- 
liament. The prorogue has to be sent by special 
messenger from Osborne, Isle of Wight, where the 
Queen, aided by her constitutional advisers, makes it 
some days in advance. Whether it is baked, fried or 
boiled I do not know. From the way it is spoken of 
by the press I am inclined to think it is hatched. 
The journals say the council sat upon it. Be that as 
it may, it is exceedingly slow and tiresome. 

We prorogue things in the States with more 
ease. We all know that when the hour approaches 
for our representatives to return to their constituents 
things grow more lively and rapid than ever. The 



Prorogation of Parliament. 265 

only part our chief executive takes in proroguing is 
to approve all the steals the last house gives birth to. 

When Henry Clay prorogued James K. Polk, he 
merely shook his long finger at the little speaker and 

thundered out: " Go home, you, where you 

belong." It was not necessary to use in the proroga- 
tion of James K. such strong language, but the Ken- 
tucky statesman was a very profane man. I am 
pained to write it, but Henry made use of a great 
many bad words that had better be forgotten. But 
he did prorogue James K. in that abrupt manner, and 
it seemed to serve the purpose. J. K. went home. 

We accompanied our envoy extraordinary to the 
House of Lords, and arrived there about 1 p. m. It 
was proposed to prorogue at 2 p. m. We could 
scarcely call it a good day for peers, for not one could 
be discovered on the benches below, nor when the 
Commons appeared at the bar to be dismissed for the 
holidays did over half a dozen respond to the sum- 
mons. This formal matter is evidently not treated 
with much respect. 

The spectators were mainly made up of General 
Schenck's little crowd. But spectators are not en- 
couraged, as I have noted before. One American 
lady, the brilliant pen-driver, Mrs. Barnard, arriving 
too late for the shadowing protection of the diplo- 
matic wing, was arrested at every entrance. Nothing 
23 



266 Selected Prose Sketches. 

but her cool perseverance and General Schenck's 
popularity with the ministry enabled her to win her 
away to the charmed interior. As it was, her ap- 
proaches were slow and tiresome, and she met retir- 
ing, evidently baffled and disappointed, titled English 
ladies who were accustomed, in all human probabil- 
ity, to go where they pleased at all other times. 

There was evidence of a hitch somewhere. We 
sat patiently for the prorogue to make its appearance 
four weary hours. In the meantime all sorts of ru- 
mors were afloat. One said the original prorogue had 
been lost in the channel while crossing over, and Her 
Gracious Majesty the Queen had to make another. 
Then it was asserted that a railroad collision had oc- 
curred, and that the prorogue was under no end of 
smashed-up trains, with three hundred volunteers dig- 
ging it out. Another rumor had it that Her Gracious 
Majesty, after consultations with John Brown, had 
positively refused a prorogue, and the ministry were 
on their official knees begging the old lady to let 
them rest a while. 

In the meantime, at intervals, a gentleman in 
knee-breeches and a sword would hurry into the vacant 
hall below, perspire freely, and then hurry out. One 
of these looked in the corners and under the seats, as 
if some peer had dropped his prayer-book. Justice 
Miller corrected this by saying that an Englishman's 



Prorogation of Parliament. 267 

prayer-book was the book of " The Peerage," and 
that it could not be dropped. General Schenck sug- 
gested that probably he was looking for the pro- 
rogue. Two hours went by without any demonstra- 
tion, and weary hours they were. Waiting for dinner 
when one is hungry tries the patience and the stomach. 
Waiting in a dreary station for a late train will make 
one wish he were dead. But neither of these trials 
compare to that of a small party of restless Ameri- 
cans deprived of their tobacco and denied the exqui- 
site privilege of putting their republican feet above 
their republican heads, with short intermissions for 
refreshments in the way of mixed drinks, while wait- 
ing for a worn-out ceremony of an effete despotism. 
We could not even talk politics. The State Depart- 
ment in Washington has but one instruction to its 
diplomatic agents in Europe, and that is to keep the 
eagle caged. 

" Oh ! look here, General," cried one of our 
party, " I've only twenty-four hours to do London. 
Can't you hurry this thing up a little? I haven't 
seen the Tower yet." 

" My Christian friend," responded the minister, 
" my right to hurry up the British lion might be 
questioned." 

" I wish somebody would twist his royal old tail," 



268 Selected Prose Sketches. 

sighed the impatient citizen. " I want to see the 
Tower and the waxworks." 

" But, General," asked a fair lady, " suppose the 
prorogue does n't come, what then ?" 

"A mutton-chop and a glass of ale," responded 
our minister. 

At last a gentleman in robes, accompanied by a 
gentleman without robes, entered the deserted house, 
and Robes, taking up a huge card, proceeded to read, 
with the singsong chant peculiar to -" Luds " when 
engaged in this sort of thing. It took old Robes 
some time to get through with this. When he ended, 
the other man, without robes, threw himself in a 
kneeling position into a chair and continued the 
chant without a card. His position indicated prayer, 
but the way he clung to his hat and cast uneasy 
glances to one side, as if in search of his umbrella, 
proved that his thoughts did not elevate to any ex- 
tent. Ending this prayer old Robes cracked a joke, 
at which both laughed heartily as they passed out. 

Then we had nearly two more hours of patient 
waiting. General Schenck, requesting two of his 
stoutest friends to awaken him when the prorogue 
arrived, dropped into a gentle diplomatic slumber 
that lasted until a slight disturbance below indicated 
the coming event. Six peers of the realm, clad in 
robes and ermine, with their aristocratic intellects 



Prorogation of Parliament. 269 

covered with beehives and surmounted by cocked 
hats, marched in. Accompanying them came also 
four clerks in knee-breeches and beehives. 

Also at the same time and place appeared divers 
and sundry articles of bedroom and kitchen furni- 
ture, such as a crimson pillow and a gilt poker, and 
other things said to indicate something that had been 
buried in Westminster so many hundred years ago 
that no one is certain to what they all amount. Our 
minister informed us that the bills that had not yet 
received the sanction of Her Majestic Majesty were 
to be approved. And the manner of the approval 
was for a clerk to bob up and read the title, then four 
clerks bobbed up and bowed, then one of the six com- 
missioners said, solemnly : 

" Qui vi qua vi stouc a lum navi buck." 

" What's that, General ?" queried one of our 
party. 

" Old Norman French," replied the Minister, 
promptly. 

" Oh !" said the questioner, much relieved. 

After this interesting ceremony, that was so 
touching that some of our more impulsive Americans 
shed tears and wished a prorogue might be imported 
to America, we had the Queen's address, that was 
chanted by a miserable cove who seemed to have a 
cold in his head. Then we had more old Norman 



270 Selected Prose Sketches. 

French and a dismissal, upon which all ran out — the 
" all " meaning six peers and two commons — like 
schoolboys. So ended the impressive scene. 

I have witnessed several impressive scenes in my 
time. I was present when Andy Johnson was sworn 
in as Vice-President. I once saw a hog go over the 
falls of Magara ; it was a frightful fall of pork. I 
was by when Snapp delivered his maiden speech in 
Congress. But all these and many others fade into 
insignificance before this imposing — imposing is the 
word — ceremony of prorogation in Parliament. 

I do not wish to be impertinent, but I would 
humbly suggest to Her Most Gracious Majesty that if 
she could keep about her august person an assort- 
ment of first-class prorogues, so as to send one off at 
an early hour, and not to keep fellows waiting, it 
would altogether be pleasing, if not profitable. 



The Whig Party on its Travels. 271 



The Whig Party on its Travels. 

It is generally believed that the "Whig party is 
dead. This is a popular delusion. That it went out 
of active political life is very true. When the Dem- 
ocratic party went South for its health, the Whig 
party retired to the shades of private life and lived 
on its respectability. This is rather poor sort of living, 
but some people seem to thrive on that diet. The 
venerable surviving Whig party does. It may be 
seen in the person of the Hon. John B. Buntywag, 
at any hour after 12 m., and before 5 p. m., by any re- 
spectable individual of good family possessed of a 
swallow-tail and a card. Should the card have a 
crest the owner is all the more welcome. It is well to 
purchase a few of that sort. They can be had at the 
same price as plain ones, and when you visit the late 
Whig party they oil the hinges of aristocratic doors 
and facilitate an interview — if that is desirable. But, 
considering our brief existence and its uncertainties, 
such as ferry-boats, railroad collisions, Tammany se- 
curities, and Erie stock, one wonders at anybody 
wishing to know the late Whig party. 

It lives in the person of the Hon. John B. Bun- 
tywag. The Hon. John B. has been in the Senate 



272 Selected Prose Sketches. 

of the United States. His father was in the Senate 
before him. He is educating his son for the Senate, 
and it is proposed, so long as a male heir is furnished 
the line, who escapes the lunatic asylum or the refuge 
for hopeless imbeciles, to have a Buntywag in that 
honorable position. As the only qualifications neces- 
sary are the name and intense dignity, the training 
does not call for much expenditure of brain. 

Last summer the "Whig party visited various pub- 
lic resorts. It could be encountered at any fashionable 
watering place. It was noted for its dignity and re- 
serve. It was always uneasy lest some low fellow, 
male or female, would speak to it. Were any such 
to address this family it would immediately fall from 
its high estate, and be lost forever. The conse- 
quences were that the Buntywag family, anticipating 
such ruin, was continually on the defensive. In the 
morning, the patriarch would put on, with his clean 
linen, an additional coat of dignity. He would starch 
up as it were, and, marching at the head of his little 
force, descend with great caution to the breakfast 
room. Every move indicated an apprehension that 
the enemy might rush out from around a corner and 
suddenly speak to some one of the family. This 
was provided for. This was guarded against. If any 
low wretch dared attempt such an outrage the family 
was prepared to annihilate the vile creature. 



The Whig Party on its Travels. 273 

Some envious people insinuate that the progeni- 
tors of the Buntywags were soap-boilers. This is not 
so. The Buntywags never had sense enough to be 
soap-boilers. The great progenitor of the illustrious 
Buntywags was a casualty. He was an undertaker — 
hence the dignified training of the family. He fell 
heir to a man who, dying of the small-pox, cut off his 
family and left his means to his undertaker. Old 
Buntywag invested in real estate. The real estate 
went up, carrying with it the family. This is the 
whole story — and not a very entertaining one — but il- 
lustrative. 

The present family of Buntywags is timid. The 
Whig party always was timid. When the slavery 
agitation came on, the Whig party deprecated it, and 
said the agitators were low fellows, and ought to be 
discountenanced. If they were properly discounte- 
nanced the agitation would cease. The old Whig 
scow resembled the venerable gentleman, who, going 
on ship-board, put on his nightcap and retired to his 
berth. When the storm came, he sent word to the 
captain to stop that hollowing, as he could not sleep, 
and for heaven's sake keep the sailors from running 
about the deck, as they shook the boat so it made 
him sick. 

Mr. John B. Buntywag and family were travel- 
ing for pleasure. A more unhappy set were never 



274 Selected Prose Sketches. 

caught abroad. Fear, we are told, is contagious. 
Mr. Buntywag took the disorder and gave it to his 
family. They could not sit comfortably in the cars 
for fear of collisions. They drank bad brandy and 
starved themselves into hideous headaches from fear 
of cholera that was three thousand miles away. On 
steamboats Mr. Buntywag and his interesting family 
slept in their clothes, twisted through their life-pre- 
servers, each for fear of explosions. Mr. Buntywag, 
once a gentleman of weight, was losing flesh every 
two minutes, his good wife had screamed herself into 
the bronchitis, and his two admirable daughters were 
all the while looking around for something to be 
frightened at. 

Mr. Buntywag was distinguished in his appear- 
ance. Somewhat short in stature, he was, as I inti- 
mated, corpulent. He indulged in white waistcoats, 
and many-colored handkerchiefs, that tied tight 
around his neck, with a very red face above, with 
pop-eyes, gave out an idea that he was indulging in 
a very genteel mode of suffocation, or every man his 
own gallows. Mrs. Buntywag was a delicate lady of 
refined sensibilities. The two daughters were prom- 
ising girls — promising I say, for as yet they presented 
the appearance of only two very fine frames — having 
shot into womanhood without waiting for the under- 
pinning, framing, or plaster. 



The Whig Party on its "Travels. 275 

The party arrived at Niagara one warm July 
morning, Mr. Bunty wag seeing nothing but thieves 
and pickpockets around him, and death and destruc- 
tion ahead. 

Our hero issued from the Cataract House in state 
— the neckcloth tied tighter than ever ; the two 
daughters marched before, he had his wife under one 
arm, a good stick under the other. With the hus- 
band-at-common-law, the wife and stick always go 
together, at least they do in Blackstone. Mr. Bunty- 
wag is an old-fashioned husband-at-common-law, had 
his eyes about him, and saw on the railroad before 
the hotel, a huge blue box, to which were attached 
two horses, while a man stood on one side and blew 
a horn. Between every blast he sang out, " To Sus- 
pension Bridge, Maid of the Mist, the famous whirl- 
pool, Brock's monument, and other natural curiosities 
— all for one dollar ! " Our friend did not understand, 
but he guessed it was to go somewhere. The thing 
looked safe, and Mr. Buntywag seated his family and 
himself, and the nuisance — I mean the box — was 
pulled away. 

After a short ride the party were brought in 
sight of the Suspension Bridge, that like a net scarf 
was flung over the great gulf below. Mr. B. pre- 
pared to cross— the two daughters walked before — he 
had the wife under one arm, and the stick under the 



276 Selected Prose Sketches, 

other. At the moment Buntywag and family in- 
vaded the bridge, a large number were promenading 
to and fro, and a hack, with an old lady known by 
the name of Mrs. Swansdown, was slowly wending 
its way toward the Canada side. 

The sublime view broke on Mr. Buntywag's 
sight, and he became alarmed. He looked 'way 
down, down into the depths where the blue waters 
were boiling and tossing like millions of angry devils. 
What a narrow passage — what thin threads held 
them up two hundred and fifty feet above death ! 

His heart throbbed — his brain became confused. 
He quickened his steps — he poked his daughters with 
his stick — then pushed on. The walk turned to a 
run. With a short shout, now frantic with fear, 
he pulled his wife along, and poked and beat his 
daughters, who screamed terribly. The visitors seeing 
and hearing this awful uproar became alarmed. They 
thought the bridge was falling, and fled amain. The 
women screamed, and the men shouted. The hack 
driver, startled by this uproar in his rear, whipped his 
horses into a gallop, shaking the bridge and adding 
to the terror — after he had knocked over a deaf old 
gent, who was silently drinking in the beauties of na- 
ture. Mr. Buntywag and family made good time — 
they did seven hundred and fifty feet in an incredibly 
short space of time ; but the crowd had the start, 



The Whig Party on its Travels. 277 

and they rushed out upon the Canada side, much 
confused, and greatly frightened. 

The old gent was picked up considerably dam- 
aged, and carried into the Elgin House. The crowd 
was indignant, and would have pitched the respected 
Mr. Buntywag over the bridge, had not Mrs. Swans- 
down created — as she was in the habit of doing — a 
diversion. Attempting to get out of the hack win- 
dow, she stuck fast, and half in and half out, she 
screamed dismally. The crowd laughed and Mr. 
Buntywag escaped. 

At Niagara, people are rushed about. There is 
no place on the face of the earth where so much 
walking is done. You climb up, and you scramble down 
— you are dampened at this point, and drenched at 
that. You cross over and walk, you return and 
walk ; and, by a wise arrangement, by which you are 
got along, your pockets are lightened at every step. 
There is a tradition extant to the effect that when the 
Wandering Jew visited Niagara he was whipped by 
a hackman, and so cheated and ill-treated that he 
made sixteen attempts at suicide by leaping over the 
falls with a copy of Bancroft's United States tied to 
his neck. 

Two days after the stampede on the suspension 
bridge, Mr. Buntywag and party — for he now had 
Mrs. Swansdowu under the protection of his paternal 



278 Selected Prose Sketches. 

stick — might have been seen picking their way under 
Goat Island Cliff, on their road to the Cave of the 
Winds. Custom had imparted some confidence to 
Mr. Buntywag, and he bravely led the van. But 
when, turning a corner, he came in full view of the 
American Falls — that came down at this place like a 
river of brickbats, shivering into a million of frag- 
ments on the iron rocks with a roar like fifty thous- 
and wheelbarrows on a bowlder pavement- — Mr. 
Buntywag called a halt, and shook in his boots. 

At the extreme termination of the'path on which 
they stood, a ledge of rocks projected almost into the 
Falls, in fact, upon a portion of them the water fell, 
and was dashed into silvery spray from their slippery 
surface. These rocks have a few feet of even surface, 
and upon it, at the moment the Buntywag party 
came in sight, a young lady, of slight and delicate 
form, stood alone. Her bonnet was thrown back — 
her black hair falling in confusion about her neck, 
her beautifully chiseled face turned upward, with an 
expression of childish delight — and with her hands 
clasped, she stood an exquisite figure of life sculptur- 
ing ; not that she looked too spiritual in the midst of 
the awful war of elements. With her face to the 
Falls, at her side the Cave of the Winds kept up its 
eternal din — for the winds, forced by the flood into 
the Cave, gathered power every few minutes, and 



The Whig Party on its Travels. 279 

broke from their imprisonment with a shout like 
thunder. In a moment she stepped lightly upon the 
path, and taking the arm of a gentleman who seemed 
much amused at this specimen of childish daring, 
they walked away. 

A notion of immense bravery entered the soul of 
Buntywag. He seized Mrs. Swansdown's arm, and 
ere the old lady was aware, had pushed her to the 
ledge of rocks, where our little heroine had so lately 
stood. His huge stick contained an umbrella in dis- 
guise — unscrewing the top, he drew out the shade, 
and hoisted it above their heads. But the fates that 
tumbled over the Falls were against Buntywag. A 
gust of wind seized a fold of the "snowy drapery," 
and flung it over the devoted couple. The frail um- 
brella was beaten down — the water came in torrents — 
and Mrs. Swansdown, thinking the last day had 
surely arrived per telegraph, threw her arms convul- 
sively around Buntywag, and fell upon him. Bunty- 
wag, who had his hat beaten down over his eyes, 
when the old lady came upon him, gave up, his knees 
failed, and the unhappy couple fell to the earth. 
Still grasping the broken umbrella, our liero looked 
very like a drunken Neptune trying to shield from 
the rain a corpulent Naiad. It was scandalous. 

Two men from the neighboring lodge rushed for- 
ward, and, seizing the unfortunates, dragged them 



280 Selected Prose Sketches. 

over the rocks into the path. Mrs. Swansdown 
opened her eyes, and exclaimed, with much indigna- 
tion : " Drat that man, he '11 suffocate me yet." 

The lady I have described, while standing near 
the Cave of the Winds, with her companion, had as- 
cended the hundred feet of the Biddle stairs, and now 
sat resting upon the bench at the top. They were 
looking upon the little " Maid of the Mist/' that 
rolled upon the boiling cauldron below, when a fear- 
ful shriek smote upon their ears. Then another and 
another, with shouts and groans, and the stairs shook 
as if they were being wrenched from their foundation. 
A crowd was surely rushing up the spiral stair. The 
first that emerged was a fat, old gentleman — he 
bounded up the stairs like a crazy elephant. The 
next was an elderly maiden lady, with note-book; 
she bid fair to overtake the fat gent, and bets two to 
one might have been safely offered. The next were 
five young ladies, with two beaux, who le&d the way 
and shrieked the loudest. These were followed by a 
dandy, in undress uniform and huge moustache. His 
pace was tremendous — his leaps beyond parallel. 
'Tis said he never stopped, but jumping into the cars, 
when last heard from was on Broadway, New York. 
Last came Mr. Buntywag, poking his beloved family 
along, and all in full cry. After they had passed the 
astonished strangers, no more seemed on the way; 






The Whig Party on its Travels. 281 

but far below they heard some dismal groans. The 
gentleman ventured down in search of the distressed; 
he made some fifty steps, when he came upon poor 
Mrs. Swansdown, stretched out and groaning aloud. 
To all his questions, her only answer was, " Oh ! I 'm 
dislocated. Go for a post-mortal examiner ! " 

It seemed that Mr. Buntywag, on the return from 
his late adventure, when half way up the winding 
stairs — sickened with his last trouble — became dizzy 
with turning round so much — felt the fabric reel 
under him — and, frightened at the idea of its falling, 
gave a shout, and began with urging with his stick 
the party upward. Poor* Mrs. Swansdown puffed 
along a short distance at a lively rate, when she fell 
exhausted, and was cruelly deserted. 



24 



282 Selected Prose Sketches. 



Berkeley Springs. 

Berkeley Springs are three thousand, two hun- 
dred and eighty-two feet, three inches above the level 
of the Washington canal. 

The air is so much purer that many people are 
deceived, thinking Berkeley about twelve thousand 
feet above the level of the canal ; but the above is 
actual measurement, made on the Baltimore and 
Ohio railroad by the fare charged. This is high 
enough — Berkeley I mean, not the fare, that is too 
high — for all practical purposes. 

The Berkeley water is a chalybeate, and tastes, 
as it comes from the springs, like warm dish-water. 
When cooled it tastes like iced dish-water, with a 
slight flavor of old moccasin. Its specific is rheuma- 
tism. People come here on crutches. I beg pardon, 
they come in a stage — over a mountain road, and pay 
one dollar for a ride of two miles and a half, crutches 
included. Transportation any where in Virginia 
since the late civil war is expensive. General Lee, 
Jubal Early, Jeb Stuart, and others, spoiled the peo- 
ple in this respect. The civil war was a question 
of transportation. It cost Virginia all her negroes, 
all her old families, all her Virginia pride, did this 



Berkeley Springs. 283 

question of transportation. . But I am speaking of 
rheumatism — that is not transportation. Au contraire, 
as the Frenchman remarked when asked if he liked 
the "german." Well, patients come here who are 
lifted from the stage and go to their rooms on crutches 
and cusses. In two days they dance the " german " 
to the music of a stringed band. So many crutches 
have been thrown away that all the fences about the 
springs are made of them. 

Berkeley Springs, as a place of resort, is very 
popular with everybody, but the stockholders. The 
stockholders have come to be very wealthy, and pre- 
fer going to Long Branch, where they can contem- 
plate the Administration. Some have gone to Eu- 
rope and some have gone to — well, never mind where. 
But very few are seen about Berkeley. One stock- 
holder, however, has a cottage here. It is directly in 
the rear of the hotel. He is a venerable man of God, 
of imposing appearance, and does impose on a good 
many. Whether he will impose on the Lord and get 
his title clear to a cottage in the skies is further along. 
I first made his acquaintance when in command as 
chief of staff at Baltimore, and caught him running 
the blockade after a wife. He wishes now that he 
had invested in old red sandstone instead of Berkeley. 

The great attractions at Berkeley are the bathing 
and the band. The walks are delightfully romantic, 



284 Selected Prose Sketches. 

the mountain views are superb, the mountain mutton 
ditto, while the table at the hotel is something aston- 
ishing for a summer resort. The beds are soft, sweet, 
and clean, and I don't know of any place where an 
old couple can get clear of their rheumatic complaints 
and daughters as readily as at Berkeley. There is 
some thing in the air — perhaps it is in the water, per- 
haps the mountain mutton — that inclines one and all 
to tenderness and proposals. Old fellows get very 
frisky, and go beauing about the girls in a grotesque 
manner, while the old ladies actually get dangerous. 
The following story was told us by Jones : 
" I found myself one day at Lover's Leap (a 
precipice overlooking the Chesapeake canal and the 
eastern part of the United States), with a staid, lovely 
girl of thirty, if a day. The sun was setting in a gor- 
geous canopy of cloudy upholstery at our backs, while 
a thousand feet below us was the railway, the canal, 
and the beautiful swift-flowing Potomac. Beyond 
these stretched the wide panorama of fields, forest, and 
mountain, over which the sad shadows of night were 
stealing and softening all, like the delicate brush of 
Wyant when putting his imaginative soul into a land- 
scape. I leaned over the rocky parapet, and was 
about giving myself up to sublime emotions, when I 
felt a hand upon my shoulder. Looking up, I saw 
this aged female gazing on me with a certain some 



Berkeley Springs. 285 

thing in her eyes that sent a thrill of terror through 
my frame. 

" We were alone. There was not a soul within 
reach I could call upon for help. Although the oaths 
of boatmen on the canal, and even the voices of chil- 
dren came up clear and distinct, I might shout myself 
hoarse without attracting their attention ; and if I did, 
they could reach us only by a circuit of five or six 
miles. I shrunk instinctively from that touch, while 
my youthful and innocent countenance first paled and 
then flushed with emotion. 

" ' We are alone !' she exclaimed. 

" ' I know it — and I am unarmed,' — I faltered. 

" ' Man,' she said sternly, ' what has that to do 
with it ? Why talk of arm save the arms of bounte- 
ous nature in a scene like this ? Is not your heart 
softened and your disposition made tender by these 
surroundings V 

" ' They are not. Oh, madam — venerable female, 
spare me ! We are alone. I trusted you. I gave my 
youthful innocence trustingly to your honor ' — 

" ' Fool !"' she cried, approaching me. 

" I sprang in terror to the outer ledge of the 
dizzy rocks. It would be terrible for me, weighing 
one hundred and eighty-four, to cast myself from 
that fearful height, to fall ca-thud upon the geologi- 
cal specimens below, or worse, to disappear in the 



286 Selected Prose Sketches. 

slimy depths of that old canal, never to be heard of 
again any more than if one were a mythical dividend of 
the company. But I was resolved. I took the attitude 
of the naval commander in Billy Powell's historical 
painting of the ' Death of Perry,' and exclaimed, 
4 Thanks to the hand that reared these rocks so high 
that none may fall from them and live ! Advance 
one step, false maiden, and I die ! ' 

"Alas! there was no pity in her face. I felt my 
doom — by Jove ! I made up my mind on the instant 
to give Lover's Leap a new name, when I heard a 
noise that resembled a locomotive on an up grade, or 
a steam-tug hooked to a seventy-four. It came 
nearer and nearer. It sounded louder and louder. 
At last I saw the head and rotund form of Judge 
Wright come puffing above the summit of the 
moutain, and screaming, ' Saved ! saved ! ' I rushed 
at him, seized him in my arms with such violence 
that he lost his footing and we both went rolling 
down the declivity, fetching up in a fence-corner on 
an old sow that was there reposing, and springing up, 
went off at a canter snorting out 'Woof! woof!' as 
if crazy." 

This was Jones' story, but Jones is not alto- 
gether reliable. He has been so spoiled by being 
followed, flattered, sought, and sued by the women 
here : — being the one solitary beau — that he can not 



Berkeley Springs. 287 

get his heels to the ground, or tell the truth, if he 
tries. 

And this calls my attention to the singular 
scarcity of this article. We have no end of women 
and children in Berkeley. Women and children 
abound. The number of pretty girls, done up re- 
gardless of expense, who go tripping about in 
high-heeled boots, heels directly under the soles, 
realize the famous description in the Ethiopian mel- 
ody addressed to Daniel Tucker — 

" She smashed de bugs as she walked around, 
For de sole ob her foot made de hole in de ground. 
Out ob de way Old Dan Tucker." 

The venerable Daniel had better cease obstruct- 
ing the thoroughfare if he knows what is good for 
him, unless he can by some process come under the 
head of beau, and then the venerable Tucker is all 
right. 

The report went out one day last week that a 
beau was on his way to Berkeley. He was said to 
be young, handsome, rich, and fascinating. The ex- 
citement was intense. The New York riots, the 
dreadful explosion, the last new hat, in a word, every 
gossipy topic, went down before the expected arrival. 
We had the youth discussed in groups of two or 
three, and groups of hundreds. Young ladies talked 



288 Selected Prose Sketches. 

in their sleep, and those who were reported to know 
the youth personally became suddenly very popular. 
At last we learned that the great expected was at the 
depot, two miles and a half away. We were tele- 
graphed the startling intelligence. Then, like Sheri- 
dan's famous ride, he was two miles away; then one and 
a half, then one, then half, and then we heard the old- 
fashioned stage lumbering down the mountain side. 
The great crowd of young ladies and old ladies, fat 
ladies and thin ladies, well ladies and sick ladies, 
gathered upon the porch, and eager eyes were fixed 
upon the leathern vehicle. It stopped with a bang. 
A gentleman sitting with the driver attempted to 
descend. He did so with a gay, springy way, that 
caused him to miss his footing, and he pitched for- 
ward into the arms of Miss , who weighs two 

hundred and fifty. The poor girl had a sigh knocked 
out of her that sounded like sixteen sighs rolled in 
one. Indeed, old Balsam, who was nodding after his 
bath on the back porch, thought that sigh was the 
steam whistle of the tan-yard. 

But, alas for our beau ! His hat flew off, and 
with it his wig, leaving the young old man bald as an 
egg. His teeth bounced out, and his cheeks col- 
lapsed, passing him from twenty-five to sixty. One 
eye followed the teeth, and the girls fled screaming. 
The poor old beau recaptured the teeth and the eye, 



Berkeley Springs. 289 

inserted both, and then, straightening himself up as 
well as he could over rheumatism, neuralgia, old age, 
and gout, looked after the retreating females, and 
twisting his old mouth into the most querulous ex- 
pression, he growled out — 

" Ugh, Christ ! " 

In that expired our last forlorn hope. We have 
never expected a new beau since. 



25 



290 Selected Prose Sketches. 



Oct* pew for Titles. 

Every free-born American citizen under the 
Declaration of Independence, which declares our 
equality before the law, is born to edit a paper, hold 
an office, and invent something, generally a religion. 
In addition to these qualities, he and she, she es- 
pecially, are permeated with a desire for a title. 
Whether life on this earth anywhere is worth liv- 
ing, certainly this part under the star-spangled ban- 
ner and the screaming eagle would be suicidal but 
for the hope of happiness found in a handle to one's 
name. 

In response to this healthy demand, we have the 
country filled with majors, colonels, generals, judges, 
governors, and honorables. 

At the end of the late civil war the rush for 
epaulets was wider-spread than the gallant enlist- 
ment of volunteers during the conflict, and the great 
war secretary, Stanton, with a cynical sense of humor 
peculiar to -him, brevetted all the sutlers, wagon- 
makers, commissaries, contractors, quartermasters— 
in a word, every body soliciting the honor. A hu- 
morist once said he could not cast a stone in a crowd 
without hitting a military title. Another wag, wish- 



Our Fever of Titles. 291 

ing to get a seat in a crowded hall, cried out, 
" Colonel, you are wanted," and a hundred and fifty 
hastened out. 

This is our American human nature. We in- 
herit the trait from our English ancestors, who with 
all their heroic qualities, are born snobs. An Eng- 
lishman who has braved the dangers of the deep, and 
fought unmoved by fear in all the battles of the 
world, will bump his head upon the floor in the pres- 
ence of a lord. He can scarcely breathe in the pres- 
ence of royalty. He gasps and shuts his eye when 
he says, " Your Gracious Majesty." We would bump 
our skulls and gasp, had we a chance. When any 
scion of a royal family visits our shores, our men 
lose their heads, and our women go mad. We have 
seen a roomful of the last-named with their sight 
glued, as it were, to a prince, and they seemed to be 
tasting him in their mouths. 

When our laborers combine to look after inter- 
ests, they call themselves " Knights of Labor." " The 
Sons of Toil " would be more appropriate and influ- 
ential. But the word knight has a high, toney sound, 
although it was held by the meanest sneaks and cut- 
throats of Europe. Knights of Labor indeed ! 
Much the original pests labored! They sought to 
live on the labor of others, and were not nice as to 



292 Selected Prose Sketches. 

how they accomplished that comfortable result — gen- 
erally by violence, and always through fraud. 

We once saw some five thousand men parading 
the avenues of Washington. They went through the 
most complicated maneuvers. They were dressed 
most gorgeously, with swords and sashes, and ostrich- 
feathered cocked hats, and called themselves Knights 
of something. We thought last Knight, or Knight 
before last, would be more appropriate. We learned 
that they were all good, honest, peaceable citizens, 
mostly tailors, hatters, and shoemakers, who were 
banded together for benevolent purposes. But why 
Knights ? Why not Good Samaritans or Brothers-in- 
law? The word knight, however, sounded so grand. 
It was such comfort to be called " Sir Knight." 
Think of a retail dealer in allspice, pepper, salt, and 
soap, in a little shop which a stout man could run a 
stick through, shoulder up, and march off with, be- 
ing got up in ostrich-plumes, cocked hat, sword and 
sash, and being addressed as " Sir Knight ! " The 
honest citizen of the grocery would be amazed to 
know that he had taken on himself the form of a 
swashbuckler and public nuisance. Knights, in- 
deed ! But " men are children of a larger growth." 

There is much in a name. One of the most ef- 
fective and powerful organizations in the United 
States is the " Brotherhood of Engineers," and it 



Our Fever of Titles. 293 

owes much to its title, for it indicates intelligence and 
a purpose. 

Our official titles in the civil service are more in- 
dicative of snobbery than aught else. The honorable 
has come to be the last resort of ambitious imbecility 
in that direction. A man who serves three days in 
any official capacity in the legislature is an honorable 
for the remainder of his life. We read in a Wash- 
ington journal an obituary notice of the sudden death 
of the Hon. Caesar Stokes, who was killed by falling 
from his cart in a gravel-pit. He was a colored mem- 
ber of the historical feather-duster, spittoon terri- 
torial legislature of the District of Columbia. 

There was once a joke that ran through the six 
old hulks that made our late navy, that told of letters 
being received aboard one of the six, of huge en- 
velopes and heavy seals, directed to Hon. Henry Au- 
gustus Singlepit, assistant paymaster of acting pay- 
master John Hodge, U. S. N*. 

The most striking illustration of this sort of thing 
is to be found in our Senate at Washington. A sen- 
ator carries more dignity to the square inch than any 
human creature on earth. This is accorded him in 
his commission. There was a time in the half-for- 
gotten past when the position of senator was merely 
a pedestal upon which the incumbent was lifted to 
public notice, and held his own through his abilities. 



294 Selected Prose Sketches. 

Now the pedestals hold for us the commonest sort of 
men; that is all; and the airs these officials take 
upon themselves are to the more thoughtful simply 
ridiculous. They are the Sir Knights of the cocked 
hats, mostly men who have bought their chairs, or 
had them purchased by corporations seeking to run 
the government for their selfish ends. It makes a 
cultured American sink in shame to his shoes to have 
an intelligent foreigner brought in contact with one 
of these pretentious solons. 

All this hankering after titles, and thefts of ped- 
igree, with the accompanying coats of arms, are 
unworthy the American people. Our ancestors were 
good, honest, hard-working laborers, and we are asses 
befouling their graves when we give w T ay to the snob- 
bery that would deny their existence or ignore their 
calling. Come, now, let us confess to what we are, 
and take an honest pride in the brave sons of toil 
who conquered a continent, and gave us all a nation 
of which we can be proud. 



The Death Penalty. 295 



The Death Penalty. 

We hang a murderer because we are in the 
habit of doing so. Again, we condemn him to 
death for that we do not know what else to do with 
him. Again, we sustain the death penalty from a 
feeling of vengeance. 

These are motives, not reasons. When we ap- 
peal to reason, there is a failure in sustaining the 
practice. Regarding all human endeavor as fallible, 
it is not wise to do that which can not be undone. 
True, when we subject a criminal to a loss of free- 
dom we take a part of his life which can not be 
restored; but if this has been done unjustly we can 
in a measure recompense the loss. This is not the 
case when the unfortunate is deprived of life The 
law really does what the law condemns. It is claimed 
that to act otherwise is to traverse the moral sense of 
the community. This comes not from a sense of 
justice, but of vengeance. When a murder is com- 
mitted, the act arouses a feeling of horror and wrath. 
If time were given and a delay made between the 
condemnation and the death by the executioner, this 
feeling would not only subside, but swing over to the 
other extreme. As it is, the custodians of the con- 



296 Selected Prose Sketches. 

demned find it difficult to keep out sickly sentiment- 
alists with their gifts of flowers and tenders of sym- 
pathy. 

This moral sense that sustains the death penalty 
originates in great measure from the clergy. It is 
strange, but there is no class, and never has been any 
class, so vindictive and cruel as the followers of the 
forgiving Savior. We have of record not only the 
religious wars, the most horrible of all human con- 
flicts, lit up along the past by fires that consumed 
the helpless, but the story of the Inquisition. Our 
pious friends of the pulpit abandon the Gospel and 
fall back upon the theology of the Jews. To be con- 
sistent they should preach the full Mosaic doctrine 
of an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. Proba- 
bly they would but that Christian civilization has 
given us a higher sense of justice and a keener ap- 
preciation of our Father in heaven, as taught us by 
the Savior. 

Slowly, but steadily, we have been influenced by 
our common sense and better feeling to a departure 
from the old barbaric treatment of the condemned. 
Time was, and the practice yet remains in some of 
our newer localities, when it was thought necessary 
to give full effect to a hanging that it should be pub- 
lic. The judge, in condemning the man to death, sol- 



The Death Penalty. 297 

emnly fixed the day and hour, and the public was in- 
vited to witness the brutal spectacle. The public 
was not slow to respond. "We learned, after a time, 
that instead of an awful warning it was regarded 
very much as a crowd looks on a bull fight, when 
a wretched animal is slowly tortured to death. The 
enjoyment of the show was stimulated to some extent 
by the danger attending the spectacle to the cruel 
performers. The crowd about the gallows jeered, 
laughed, sang, and generally got drunk. The crim- 
inal, if he went to his death with any composure, was 
regarded as a hero. Murders have been committed 
in the very presence of the awful example. 

The clergy helped on this sort of perversion of a 
warning by accompanying the wretch to the scaffold 
with hymns and prayers and assurances of divine 
forgiveness. The absurdity of this seemed to strike 
no one. The victim of the awful crime had been cut 
off" in his or her sins, with every prospect of eternal 
punishment, while the criminal was swung into 
heaven. This seems shocking, but is it not fact ? To 
be logical and consistent we must regard the mur- 
derer fully forgiven, looking from heaven down upon 
his victim suffering eternal torture for having passed 
to judgment without repentance. 

We have laughed at the Frenchman condemned 



298 Selected Prose Sketches. 

to death for the murder of his parents, who, when 
asked by the judge if he had any thing to say before 
sentence, responded that he hoped the court would 
have mercy on a poor orphan. We do not laugh, 
however, at the good parson who hurries forward to 
assist the assassin to a reward denied his victim. 

The good people of New York have advanced 
yet another step. Choking a man to death with a 
rope has been justly regarded as a clumsy, barbarous 
practice, and the legislature has substituted death by 
electricity. It robs the penalty of much that is ob- 
jectionable, and adds greatly to its terror. The mode 
prescribed by the law which gives to the judge the 
power to sentence, but leaves to the sheriff the pre- 
cise moment when the execution shall take place, 
throws a dreadful mystery about the killing that will 
strike the common criminal with horror. 

This law is to be approved, not on the ordinary 
ground used by supersensitive people, that it lessens 
the punishment, but that in fact it adds to it. We 
are not disturbed, however, by the pains and penal- 
ties attending the death penalty. When a criminal 
is to be disposed of for having murdered us, we will 
be quite indifferent as to the measure of his suffer- 
ing, very much as he was as to ours when killing us. 



The Death Penalty. 299 

In this we sympathize with the member of , the French 
Corps-Legislatif, who, when the abolition of the death 
penalty was being discussed, said : " Messieurs, I am 
in favor of this measure, but I want the assassins to 
begin." 



300 Selected Prose Sketches. 



The Dade to Litefatafe, 

The tendency to over-refinement that accompa- 
nies social life in civilized communities marks the 
progress of literature. As we have the Rosa Matilda 
in the one, we have the dude in the other. When 
people come to think more of the shell than the sub- 
stance the shell covers, we have a condition that may 
be very delicate and refined, but is sure to be without 
strength or originality. We may in this way weaken 
in our vices, but at the same time we weaken in our 
virtues. Moralists through all the ages have dwelt 
upon the effeminacy that follows wealth, and in that 
the loss of the manly qualities that make real good- 
ness. In this way w r ars are said to be ennobling, 
because in spite of their brutality they throw men 
back on the coarser strength upon which true man- 
hood is based. A coarse soldier, if possessed of the 
high courage that disregards his own life, has a better 
chance to be a true gentleman than the civilian of the 
highest polish without courage ; for the true gentle- 
man is one who generously regards the rights of 
others. If a man has reached that point where life 
itself is a secondary consideration, he is better pre- 
pared to be generous in things that concern life. 



The Dude in Literature. 301 

All brave men are not necessarily gentlemen, 
for they may not have the thoughtful culture that 
recognizes the rights of others ; but all true gentle- 
men are brave. Without the manhood, this com- 
bative quality indicates selfishness intensified. The 
timid man is weak and selfish, for he can not escape 
a continuous consideration of his own safety and 
comfort. 

It is not, however, of the effeminacy of excessive 
refinement in society of which we wish to treat, but 
that of literature. In our over-training in this direc- 
tion we are losing both strength of expression and 
originality of thought. We seek to be excessively 
nice, forgetting that we may be so nice as to be nasty. 
The old maid who clad the legs of her furniture in 
pantalettes unconsciously betrayed the current of her 
own thoughts. The English people have added quite 
a number of skin-diseases to the awful list of cuta- 
neous disorders through over-bathing. To persist- 
ently wash the natural oil from the pores is to fetch 
on frightful eruptions. 

If one will study the current of literature as ac- 
cepted by the critics, one will perceive that this ex- 
cessive refinement is emasculating our works. The 
word " coarse " has come to be a sentence of condem- 
nation. No poem, essay, novel, or editorial can sur- 
vive that stigma. Were Dickens alive now, and 



302 Selected Prose Sketches. 

entering upon his wonderful career as an author, his 
books would be incontinently condemned as low and 
coarse. A New York manager of a leading theater 
said that Shakespeare had ceased to be popular be- 
cause of his vulgarity. Miss Murfree, in her charm- 
ing stories of the Tennessee mountains, retains the 
mountains, but, to suit the taste of all the old maids in 
and out of petticoats who read the Atlantic Monthly, has 
eliminated the mountaineers. Her characters are so 
refined that they have ceased to be the -hardy dwellers 
of that region, who make the air blue with their pro- 
fanity in ordinary conversation. It was Leigh Hunt, 
we believe, who said that Thomson's " Seasons " were 
seasons in Thomson's back yard. The day is not dis- 
tant, as infidelity and refinement progress, when the 
Bible itself, like Shakespeare, will be pronounced 
coarse and vulgar — so much so, indeed, that an ex- 
purgated edition will be necessary. 

Much of this false literature comes of a study of 
libraries. It is building books on books ; weaving 
second-hand thoughts out of the thoughts of others. 
The straw itself is thrashed over until it gets to be 
too fine to be straw even. The great originals gained 
their greatness through a study of nature and a con- 
tact with living men. It was a rough, coarse busi- 
ness, but the result was work we call immortal. 



The Dade in Literature. 303 

Emerson tells us this, in his clear, ringing sentences, 
when he says : 

" Our age is retrospective. It builds the sepul- 
chers of the fathers. It writes biographies, histories, 
and criticisms. The foregoing generations beheld 
God and Nature face to face ; we, through their eyes. 
Why should not we also enjoy an original relation to 
the universe ? Why should not we have a poetry and 
philosophy of insight and not of tradition, and a re- 
ligion by revelation to us and not the history of theirs ? 
Embosomed for a season in nature, whose floods of 
life stream round and through us, and invite us by 
the powers they supply to action proportioned to na- 
ture, why should we grope along among the dry bones 
of the past, or put the living generation into mas- 
querade out of its faded wardrobe ? The sun shines 
to-day also. There is more wool and flax in the fields. 
There are new lands, new men, new thoughts. Let 
us demand our own works and laws and worship." 

There is nothing more fatal to the thoughtful 
progress of a race than to possess a master, in litera- 
ture or in art. The source of greatness that made 
the master was in nature, not in books or pictures or 
statuary. The student, be he author or artist, goes 
out and studies nature, and renders into work his in- 
terpretation. It maybe crude, coarse, and faulty, but 
it is original, and if such student is a genius it will be 



304 Selected Prose Sketches. 

great. But, the master once possessed by a people, 
he is studied instead of nature. Thus it is that Italy 
has had no painters since the master won the admira- 
tion of the world, and England no dramatic authors 
since Skakespeare. Libraries and galleries are good 
for mediocrity. But the dim-eyed, delicate student 
or artist, turned out to study for himself, shrinks dis- 
mayed from a contact with the real. It soils one's 
hands and discourages one's efforts. Of course ; but 
we must remember the fabled story of the demigod 
that in his death struggle gained strength from the 
earth to which he was cast. He came up dirtier, of 
course, but he came up stronger, and was conquered 
at last by being strangled in mid-air. Our authors 
and artists are dying through the same process, but 
they die with nice dignity that is very comforting to 
the critics. 

There is a revolt against this dudism going on all 
the while in the minds of the many. It breaks out 
at intervals, and when led by genius results in victory. 
Victor Hugo, for example, fought and conquered the 
classics of France. Zola to-day, in spite of his filth, 
holds a great sway the world over — not, as generally 
supposed, because of his dirt, but that he deals with 
the real. "Walt Whitman in the same way, with no 
more poetry in him than in a board fence, is held to 
be popularly a poet. He is not so filthy as Zola, be- 



The Dude in Literature. 305 

cause there is less of him, but he is real. Howells 
and James, both men of genius, owe their popularity 
to their realism, which would be yet more potent if 
they had not such a terror of being coarse. Dickens, 
we learn from Messrs. Belford, Clarke & Co., has such 
a popular demand to-day that it keeps them busy to 
fill orders, while the more refined Thackeray does not 
pay for the reprint. 

We say then to the youthful author, Do not 
bother yourself about the dignity of your language 
or the nicety of your style. Study the common tongue ; 
and if you have a thought to express, so word it that 
the masses may comprehend. You can not fight er- 
ror with an open hand. Let your polish be the polish 
that comes from the sharpening of a weapon, and not 
the glitter of a uniform that means nothing. In 
ninety-nine instances out of a hundred to be dignified 
is to be dull, and dullness is death to an author. 



26 



306 Selected Prose Sketches. 



Vacant Pews and (Homed Pulpits. 

The homes, so called, of our larger cities are in a 
majority of cases without comfort, and in nearly all 
instances without refinement.- The class upon which 
we once so prided ourselves, made up of families pos- 
sessed of a competence, and enabled through a rea- 
sonable income from steady work to have about their 
homes some comfort and a few luxuries, is rapidly 
disappearing. We have left us two classes only, 
made up of the very rich and the poor. The mer- 
chant, the mechanic, and even the common laborer, 
who once could boast of a humble home of his own, 
and enough steady employment to make that home 
comfortable, is rarely met with. We believe, indeed, 
that he exists only in the imagination of Senator Ed.- 
munds. Well authenticated statistics inform us that 
we have a larger percentage of tenantry to our pop- 
ulation than any people on the face of the earth. 
This not only includes our great commercial, mining, 
and manufacturing centers, but the rural regions as 
well. We learn that, throughout the agricultural 
regions, while the farms lessen in number, the farmers 
increase. 

We know what this means. We recognize at a 



Vacant Pews and Worried Pulpits. 807 

glance that the growth of our country in national 
wealth, which is claimed to be amazing, is not a 
healthy growth. For that is not healthy which gives 
prosperity to a few and poverty to the masses. 

This has been so long and so generally recognized 
that it has come to be commonplace, and people 
weary of its reiteration. We indulge in this weari- 
ness for the purpose of calling attention to a conse- 
quence that is not so familiar. 

It is remarked by observant lookers-on from 
abroad that our laboring classes are thoroughly ig- 
norant of art, and take no pleasure in contemplating 
works of art, as do the like classes in the towns of 
Europe. The reason given for this is that we have 
no specimens in our highways, and few in galleries. 
The latter are closed against the laboring classes on 
the only day a laborer can have to visit them, and 
that is Sunday. 

The wrong done our people by this can scarcely 
be overestimated. A taste for art can generally 
be cultivated. It is quite impossible to educate a 
people in science and literature, for this depends on 
intellectual faculties that our Heavenly Father, from 
a wise purpose to us unknown, has been very sparing 
in distributing. But almost every man is capable of 
being taught to admire, if not love, the beautiful in 
art. What an element in the way of social improve- 



308 Selected Prose Sketches. 

nient or progress this cultivated taste is we all recog- 
nize, and what happens to a race that neglects it we 
all know. 

Now, it is possible for a people to possess the 
highest appreciation of, and admiration for, art, and 
yet he semi-barbarous, for the Christian element is 
necessary to bring about real civilization ; but it is 
quite impossible for a race to be without some culti- 
vation in the way of art, and be civilized at all. 

It is not strange to a thoughtful observer, to note 
that as a nation we are on the down grade. Such an 
observer from abroad can not cross Broadway, for 
example, without learning that life and limb are in 
peril from a community that has more law and less 
order than any people the world over. He is pre- 
pared to learn then that our galleries of art — such as 
exist — are closed against the poor, and he is ready to 
receive without wonder the further fact that our 
churches also are closed against the poor. 

It is this last truth that is somewhat new in the 
way of being recognized, although quite old as a 
matter of fact. 

At a convocation of Protestant ministers held at 
Chickering Hall last November, on behalf of the 
Protestant community of New York, the following 
was officially stated as to the religious condition of 
the city : 



Vacant Peivs and Worried Pulpits. 309 

" The population of New York City has for years 
been steadily and rapidly increasing, while at the 
same time the number of churches has been relatively 
decreasing. In 1840 there was one Protestant church 
to every 2,400 people; in 1880, one to 3,000; and in 
1887, one to 4,000." 

Now, to this startling admission could have been 
added another, no less deplorable, and that is that the 
attendance has decreased more rapidly than the 
churches, and, in such as now remain open a seventh 
part of the time, there is an exhibit of empty seats 
quite depressing to the minister. If we consider the 
Protestant population only, not one-tenth are church 
attendants — and not a tenth of these are true 
believers. 

The reason for this deplorable condition was 
much discussed by the good men making up the 
clerical convention, and the prevailing opinion seemed 
to be, as gathered from the utterances, that this dis- 
heartening result came from the active interference 
of the Catholic clergy — or papists, as our friends 
termed them. 

There was much truth in this. These zealous 
" papists " are certainly making great inroads upon 
our population ; but, admitting that they take large 
numbers from the Protestant churches, there yet re- 
mains a vast population of non-going church people 



310 Selected Prose Sketches. 

that the so-called papists have not influenced, nor, in- 
deed, as yet approached. What then is the cause of 
this irreligious condition ? 

"We believe that we can help our clerical friends 
to a solution of this religious mystery. It comes 
from a lack of consideration for the masses they seek 
to instruct. There is a want of sympathy for the 
poor, that not only shuts the galleries of art from 
the laboring classes, but closes the Protestant churches 
also. 

These structures, while scarcely to be classed as 
works of art — for they are carefully divested of all 
that appeals to good taste — are yet luxurious affairs 
at which the rich and well-born, in purple and fine 
linen, are expected to attend. They are more social 
than religious affairs, and there is no place for the 
ragged, even if such appeared from a public bath 
duly cleansed of their offensive dirt. To make this 
exclusiveness complete, the churches are filled with 
pews that, like boxes at the opera, are the property 
of subscribers able to pay for such luxuries. True, 
certain pews are reserved as free seats for the poor ; 
but the class sought thus to be accommodated are 
averse to being put in their poverty on exhibition, as 
it were, even for the luxury of hearing a solemn- 
toned clergyman whose .theological gymnastics are ' 
as much beyond the comprehension of the hearers 



Vacant Pews and Worried Pulpits. 311 

as they are beyond that of the reverend orator 
himself. 

To realize our condition in this respect, let our 
reader imagine, if he can, our blessed Savior and his 
apostles entering bodily, to-day, one of these edifices 
built to His worship. Weary and travel -stained, 
clad in the coarsest of garments, the procession would 
scarcely start along the dim-lit aisles before that aus- 
tere creation of nature in one of her most economical 
moods, the sexton, would hurry forward to repel fur- 
ther invasion of that most respectable sanctuary of 
God. Our Savior would be informed that somewhere 
in the outlying spaces of poverty-stricken regions 
there was a mission house suitable for such as He. 

We must not be understood as intimating, let 
alone asseverating, aught against this form of Chris- 
tianity. It is so much better than none that we feel 
kindly toward it. The religious evolution that de- 
velops a respectable sort of religious purity, that 
builds a marble pulpit and velvet-cushioned pews, is 
all well enough if it quiets the conscience and soothes 
with trust the death-bed of even a Dives. We re- 
gard a Salvation Army, that makes a burlesque of 
religion as it goes shouting with its toot-horns and 
stringed instruments, as to be tolerated, because it is 
better than the Bob Ingersolls. We only seek to in- 



312 Selected Prose Sketches. 

form the well-meaning teachers of the religion of to- 
day why it is they preach to empty pews. 

Few of ns are aware of what we are doing when we 
close our galleries and churches, and open our saloons 
to the poor. This last, so far, has proved impossible. 
But let our hot gospelers, whose creed is based on 
"Be it enacted" visit any one of the poor abodes of 
the laborers denied admission to innocent places of 
amusement on the only holiday they have for such 
recreation. Such investigator will descend to a sub- 
terranean excavation dug in the sewer-gas-filtered 
earth, where the walls sweat disease and death. 
These are homes for humanity. Or he will ascend 
rotten stairways to crowded rooms, heated to suffo- 
cation by pestilent air poisoned by over used breath 
from men, women and children, packed in regardless 
of health, comfort, and decency. These are the so- 
called homes of thousands and thousands ; and the 
wonder is, not that they die, but that they live. "We 
send millions of money with missionaries to foreign 
shores ; to our own flesh and blood we send — the po- 
lice. Loving care and patient help are bestowed on 
distant pagans ; poor-houses, prisons, and wrath are 
the fate awarded to our brothers at home. 

A little way from these abodes of misery and 
crime the saloon is open, with its gilded iniquity, 
warm, cheerful, and stimulated with liquid insanity 



Vacant Pews and Worried Pulpits. 313 

in bottles and beer-kegs. Do we wonder that the 
churches are empty and the saloons crowded ? 

The advent of our blessed Savior was heralded 
by the anthem of the heavenly hosts, that sang 
" Glory to God on high, and peace and good-will to 
men on «arth." The few sad years of our Redeemer's 
life among men were passed with the poor, the sin- 
ful, and the sorrowing. We have to-day much glory 
to God on high, and no good-will to men on earth. 

Your churches decrease in numbers as the popu- 
lation swells, brethren, because of your lack of 
Christian sympathy! 



27 



814 Selected Prose Sketches. 



fjetfenae Tariff, a Tax; Protective Tariff, Extortion. 

"We are prepared, through long observation, to 
note without surprise the influence self-interest has 
upon conduct and character, but we are amazed to 
see how a heated contention obscures the intellect. 
These were our reflections on reading the Hon. Allen 
GL Thurman at Chicago assert that, a tariff was a 
tax. This is the fact when considering a theory, but 
is as wide of the truth as heaven from earth in the 
face of our present condition. A tariff, when levied 
for revenue to support the government, is of course, 
a tax. A tariff levied to benefit certain private in- 
terests is an extortion. It is not even plunder under 
color of law. The tax-collector who enters one's 
dwelling to secure what the law demands could just 
as well deprive the householder of his watch and 
shirt-studs under color of law, as these favored in- 
terests use the custom-house to further their business. 

A tax means a levy made on property for the 
support of the government — see Webster or any body 
else, for this is not only the scientific definition, but 
that accepted by popular usage. The law courts 
have long since held it murder to kill by firing in a 
crowd ; and it is no defense to setup that it was done 



Revenue Tariff, etc. 315 

by an officer, and that in so doing he not, only took 
took the lives of six innocent men, but killed a con- 
vict. 

A tariff for protection means this, if it means 
any thing. Under pretense of a levy it plunders for 
private use — nay, worse, for it destroys the levy made 
for the good of the government. The higher the 
tariff the lower the income, and this continues until 
prohibition is reached, and robbery is without limit 
and the government is without revenue. 

We have under the government of the United 
States some sixty millions of people. The one pur- 
suit of all this multitude is making a living. This 
can be done in two Ways, and no third. These two 
ways are, one by honest labor, and the other by theft. 
The great mass, recognizing this fact, labor honestly, 
or offer an honest labor for their living. Were the 
entire population to do this few would be rich, but 
all would be comfortable. A large minority, how- 
ever, prefer theft to labor. Greed, added to cunning, 
enables such to steal ; and most of them steal with 
impunity. It is a singular fact that a man thus con- 
stituted is not content with robbing another of his 
living, but is impelled by his brutal nature to rob 
several men. He will, if he can, sieze on and possess 
himself of the subsistence that belongs to- a thousand 
men. It is not our purpose to dwell on the peculiar- 



316 Selected Prose Sketches. 

ities of this bread-robber. It is a singular fact, how- 
ever, that this social vampire is deprived by nature of 
the capacity to enjoy what he steals. The man who 
accumulates a thousand coats finds that he can not 
enjoy one, He has costly palaces, in which he is as 
unhappy as any other animal would be; libraries 
which he can not read; picture galleries which he 
can not enjoy; he has carriages that bore him, and 
wines that he can not appreciate. We call the crea- 
ture a millionaire and envy him his possessions, 
thinking what we could do with them, failing to 
know or remember that his only delight is in the 
mere accumulation. 

However, there is no good in denouncing the 
class. It is the system that makes such a class pos- 
sible we are forced to attack. " Ding doon the nests, 
and the rooks will flee awa'," says an old Scotch 
proverb. 

The instinctive tendency of uncultured human 
nature is toward this selfish greed, and the history 
of humanity is a story of fraud through which a few 
prey upon the many. It has been the dream of the 
philanthropist to eradicate, and the effort of the just 
to restrain, this evil. As all men are born free, we 
jump to the conclusion that all are born equal. The 
conclusion is inoorrect. As no two are alike, no two 
are equally armed against aggression, and the result 



Revenue Tariff, etc. 317 

is the utter impossibility of securing a right based on 
a remaking of humanity. Yet the war goes on, and 
the framers of our National Government thought 
to strike a deadly blow in favor of even handed just- 
ice and equal rights when they destroyed a class in 
America that had so long dominated the masses in 
Europe, This was done in wiping out the law of 
primogeniture and entail. The sons will distribute, 
they said, all that the parent accumulates, and the 
government will give no hand to aid in unjust accu- 
mulation. As the government was based on the re- 
cognized axiom that it was for the benefit of the gov- 
erned, we had a right at least to have the govern- 
ment on the side of the suppressed. The hope of 
equalizing and holding humanity to a level in the 
possession of property through government inter- 
ference is as hopeless as the attempt to still the 
waves of ocean by act of congress. But we are 
neither dreamers nor impracticables in demanding 
that the government shall not give its aid to what it 
was created to prevent. 

The statement of these truths, which no reason- 
able intellect can gainsay, fetches us to a considera- 
tion of a problem now agitating the popular mind. 

A tariff for protection is not a tax. Then what 
is it? Simply a process through which the fiscal 
agency of the government is used to insure a profit 



318 Selected Prose Sketches. 

to certain moneyed interests, altogether of a private 
sort. With the people of the United States these 
interests refer mainly to mining and manufacturing. 
The government with us is merely a trust. It has 
no property of its own, and no power beyond the 
mere expression which its form gives of the sover- 
eignty that remains in the people. It can not, there- 
fore, pay bounties to one interest or class of interests 
without taking precisely the amount wrested from 
another class. Nor can the government do indirectly 
that which it is forbidden to do directly. In bringing 
the crushing weight of the general government into 
the field of private enterprise, by arresting competi- 
tion in behalf of a certain favored interest, the gov- 
ernment is guilty indirectly of an usurpation that 
not only destroys its usefulness, but makes it a des- 
potism of the most intolerable sort. 

A feeble attempt is made to prove that the au- 
thority for this abuse is to be found in the constitu- 
tion itself, and that the framers themselves acted 
upon it in the first congress held after the constitu- 
tion was accepted. Of course, this is a falsehood, 
easily seen and answered by the impartial student of 
our history. Through a fear of state jealousy, the 
first congress sought to support the general govern- 
ment, not by direct taxation, but by customs levied 
upon our commerce. If in this an incidental pro- 



Revenue, Tariff, etc. 319 

tection was given to certain industries then strug- 
gling into existence, the fathers found no reason for 
complaint. This was a tax, and as no tax can be 
collected that does not injure some one, they sought 
to minimize the harm. As Henry Clay claimed, it 
was a tax with incidental protection so slight and 
so much of a necessity that it could not well be 
avoided. 

This, however, is not the doctrine of to-day. 
The levy has no other motive, in the mouths of its 
advocates, but that of so-called protection. What 
was once a revenue tariff with incidental protection 
is now a protective tariff with incidental revenue, 
or, as the Chicago platform phrases it, no revenue 
at all. 

Of course, when this conclusion is reached, we 
are saved all discussion as to its merits or failings. 
Born in error, its life of necessity is evil. Let us 
suppose, to illustrate, that a party were organized 
whose one principle would be to kill a millionaire on 
sight, which should be sanctioned by a legal enact- 
ment, not only holding the assassin harmless, but 
paying a bounty on each scalp of a dead millionaire, 
duly certified to. All discussion as to the merits of 
such a system would be silenced by the thought of 
crime involved in the murder. This is precisely the 
condition of the Republican organization in its ad- 



320 Selected Prose Sketches. 

vocacy of what it is pleased to call protection — only 
instead of homicide we have robbery. It is not nec- 
essary to prove, for example, that out of sixty mill- 
ions of people less than one million are enriched. If 
the entire population were benefited in a material 
way by such a destruction of our liberties and our 
constitution, we should pay dearly for our moneyed 
prosperity. 

The public mind is slow to learn that nearly all 
the misery inflicted on humanity comes, not so much 
from an inequality of political rights, as from an ine- 
quality of property. A man may be poor, and yet 
content, if he be free, and by freedom we mean mas- 
ter of himself. But, if his poverty is the livery of 
servitude, he must be wretched; and there is no 
servitude so cruel as that of unrequited toil. When 
a man realizes that work is not only uncertain, but 
when obtained gives him only a bare, beggarly sub- 
sistence, with no hope of a betterment hereafter, it is 
of small difference whether his master is one man or 
a thousand men. The life given to sustain another, 
and that other a master, is not worth living. This is 
precisely the state to which this tariff of extortion 
has brought us. Our rich are growing very rich, our 
poor are getting poorer. Every day the gulf widens 
and deepens between the two, and the middle class 
of people, neither rich nor poor, but in comfortable 



Mevenue, Tariff] etc. 321 

circumstances, that formed a bridge between the two, 
is rapidly disappearing. 

"We are assured that if the government takes 
care of the wealthy class, that class will care for the 
poor. To use the language of the political arena, the 
capital so nursed by the government will afford work 
for labor. God help the men dependent on such a 
delusion as that. "There is nothing more cruel," 
said Senator Sprague, " than a million of dollars, un- 
less it be a million and a half." A wealthy mill- 
owner drawing a million and a half from his works 
will drive his coach and four from castle to castle 
with his digestion undisturbed and his dreams undis- 
torted, although he knows that his wretched work- 
men are toiling in rags, hunger, and privation to 
Avhich the millionaire would not subject his dogs. 

We have yet to learn that we suffer more from 
a power to abuse than from an abuse of power. Le- 
galize a wrong, and the wrongdoer will go. to the 
further limit of his abuse, well knowing he can not 
be questioned. An abuse of power works ever in 
the presence of an indictment, which cows the crim- 
inal and stimulates resistance. But legalized crime 
debases the law, while elevating and protecting the 
criminal. When the time comes that the judge is at 
the bar, and the convict on the bench, there is noth- 
ing left but violence to restore order. But the worst 



322 Selected Prose Sketches. 

feature of it all is the mantle of respectability it 
throws over decay. These men who prate about pro- 
viding for labor, and laboring for the prosperity of 
the country, can not look each other in the face with- 
out laughing. Of this sort is the so-called Repub- 
lican organization. It is not a political party at all. 
It is made up of certain moneyed interests, combined 
for the purpose of using the government to serve 
their selfish greed. It is altogether a commercial af- 
fair, and under it over one hundred and fifty thou- 
sand miles of operating railway have passed under 
the control, and virtually in the ownership, of less 
than sixty families. Our circulating medium is the 
property of some two thousand corporations, that 
contract or expand to suit their own selfish purposes ; 
trusts multiply, until our food, clothing, shelter, in a 
word all we live upon, are worked to make million- 
aires; and the foundation of all this stupendous 
structure to facilitate plunder rests on the extortion 
allowed by a tariff for extortion, which its supporters 
style protection, and our friends with strange blind- 
ness call a tax. 



The Kingdom of Satan. 323 



The Ki&gdom of Satan. 

How few among the advanced thinkers of our age 
take into account the social element when discussing 
reforms ! Society is of necessity conservative. All 
agitation disturbs enjoyment by threatening a change 
ot condition. Better bear the ills we have than 
suffer in our comfort the ills of progress that implies 
revolution. When the Arkansaw man asked the set- 
tler why he did not repair his roof, he answered that 
when it did not rain he did not need to, and that 
when it did rain he could not work at it. This has 
been laughed at for half a century, and yet it carries 
a moral that illustrates all attempts at repair. The 
wrongs that annoy may be borne, for we are accus- 
tomed to them and have inured ourselves to their ex- 
istence. Change, even for the better, breaks up old 
customs; and human nature is born and bred to a 
dislike of that which disturbs old habits. The farmer 
who was given to carrying his grain on horseback to 
the mill, with the grain in one end of the sack and a 
stone in the other , felt uneasy at a proposed relieving 
of his horse ; for if the string broke, he argued, the 
grain would be lost, whereas the stone could be read- 
ily replaced. 



324 Selected Prose Sketches. 

The great power, however, in society against re- 
form is the respectability it claims for itself. Respect- 
ability is conservative. It conserves all wrongs that 
have been polished to refinement, although the re- 
finement may, in fact, be a shabby sort of veneering 
and varnish. To illustrate: At Washington, not a 
century since, it was no uncommon event for an ad- 
ministration to be carted into the executive mansion 
so far gone in intoxication as to be, if possible, more 
senseless than when sober. No one ventured to com- 
ment on this, let alone denounce the disgraceful con- 
duct. When a member of the cabinet or a senator 
gives way to this beastly habit, we speak of him in 
sorrow as a distinguished inebriate. A member of 
the house of representatives, thus afflicted, is spoken 
of, without sorrow, as a drunkard. The poor clerk 
given to intoxication, is a beast, and is treated accord- 
ingly. 

How poor humanity holds its own in this respect, 
through all the ages, a few historical facts illustrate. 
Our blessed Savior, for example, was crucified, not 
because of His doctrine of peace and good-will to 
men on earth and glory to God on high, but because 
He was a Nazarene, born of a carpenter, and not only 
drove the money-changers from the temple, but 
made attacks in speeches upon the rich men of Judsea. 
In thus disturbing business relations and threatening 



The Kingdom of Satan. 325 

the social order of Jerusalem, He brought upon 
Himself the active enmity of the respectable classes, 
and so went down to a cruel death. 

No one possessed of an intellect doubts for an in- 
stant that, had our Savior allied Himself with the 
moneyed men and become the advocate of law and 
order, He would have been gladly accepted by the 
then prominent Hebrews as the heralded Messiah. 
The story of Satan carrying Him into a high mount- 
ain and showing Him a vast domain that would be 
His, provided He acknowledged Satan's dominion, 
is explained from marble pulpits to velvet-cushioned 
pews as a parable of a political import. It was a sad 
truth, told in the simple narrative of the situation 
then as it is the situation to-day. The earth, with 
all its wealth is yet held by Satan, and is at once a 
menace and a standing temptation to the reformer. 
He learns early that he can be Christ in form and 
Satan in substance. If he holds out, he will be 
shamed by epithets and pelted with stones as one who 
disturbs the business relations and threatens the so- 
cial fabric. 

We devote our time to a discussion of dogmas,, 
and waste the precious hours in deciphering obscure 
passages in Holy Writ, while the great lesson taught 
by our Savior's life and death lies unheeded before 



326 Selected Prose Sketches. 

us. In the same crucifixion that terminates his visible 
presence on earth all reform is crucified. 

We take no account of the immense power 
against goodness that is wielded by society as organ- 
ized by evil. The gates of hell are golden gates, and 
the high seats within, and all the crowns, are reserved 
for the respectable. The virtues then are not offen- 
sive, and the vices are gentlemanly. A man may not 
steal a loaf of bread, however near starvation, but he 
can defraud others of a million and not only hold his 
position but win the admiration of all. 

We deplore the benighted condition of the Dark 
Continent, and collect vast sums to convert the 
heathen, when true Christianity is less known in our 
midst than in the center of Africa. 

It is told of the earlier Christians that they won 
their way among the pagans by adopting the pagan 
form of worship. The altars erected to false gods 
and the unknown god were retained to the glory of 
the true God. The lesson has not been lost on Satan. 
When he tempted our Savior, it was not to destroy 
Christ, but to pervert His mission. What Christ re- 
jected we hasten to accept. With his cross upon our 
breasts we adore the devil. The thunder on the 
mountains is the church-music to the accompaniment 
of which we worship the golden calf. 

Not long since a sexton of a fashionable church 



The Kingdom of Satan. 327 

in our midst, being called upon to account for having 
thrust a poor woman from a velvet- cushioned pew, 
said in extenuation that the pew-owners made a 
heavy investment in the church, and that the stock- 
holders held their pews precisely as the same class 
did boxes at the opera-house, and that paupers had no 
more right to the one than the other. What would 
happen if the dirty poor were permitted to crowd in 
upou the members, and render respectable worship a 
nuisance ? This church business was like any other 
business transaction, and if the non-property holders 
did not like it, they were at liberty to let it alone. 
They had their appropriate places for worship and 
should be content, said the practical sexton. 

We do not pretend to give the words of the out- 
spoken and sensible sexton. We give his meaning. 
And that such was found satisfactory to the congre- 
gation is a fact proven by his retention in the place he 
so zealously guards. 

The social world sets its face against reform and 
is potent for mischief. It kills all movements in that 
direction by making them disreputable. The history 
of all such is curiously illustrative. The most effect- 
ive weapon of all in this direction is that of epithet. 
To call one a crank, if it does not cow the re- 
former, certainly renders him helpless. This is the 
first resort. We remember but yesterday that to 



328 Selected Prose Sketches. 

designate a man an abolitionist was to consign him 
to social infamy. To-day, those who seek to arrest 
gross extortion under form of law are sneered at as 
free-traders. The freedom that is honored in speech, 
press and religion becomes a disgrace when applied 
to trade. We have a large body of citizens who, 
looking upon public office as a public trust, revolt 
against the despotism of party and cast their votes 
regardless of caucus dictation, and they are laughed 
at and denounced as "mugwumps." .The first Mug- 
wump on record was George Washington, and his 
Farewell Address has no part so pregnant of mean- 
ing as that wherein he warns us against the evil in- 
fluence of parties, then called " factions." This 
meant then, as it means now, the Randallism which 
makes a man lose in the organization that which the 
party was organized to sustain. 

How the reform survives both reformers and its 
enemies, and becomes an element of life, history tells 
us. The treason of one generation is the loyal prin- 
ciple of another. The crank of to-day is the hero of 
the hereafter, and the stones that pelted the martyr 
to death form an altar at which the same class wor- 
ships in generations long after. 



Murmurs of the Mac-o-chee. 329 



fflapmofs of the Jttae-o-ehee. 

I met David Donald on the pike the other day. 
King David was stalking along in his usual contem- 
plative way when we collided. 

" I hear'n tell," he said, slowly and solemnly, 
"that you've been pictering me out in print as the 
champion cow-boy of Logan county — that I am the 
bald-headed, shrieking pee-wee of the rollin' prairie." 

" Not that, oh ! King David," I made response. 
" I have set you up as the pensive philosopher of the 
plains, the hermit of Squaw's Rock, the melancholy 
madman of the Mac-o-chee." 

"Well," he said, "it's a free country, specially 
to fools and fellers in buggies. A man has a right 
to call another man any thing he pleases, provided ht 
does it at a distance." 

"Why, David, I hope you're not offended." 

"I'm not partic'lar. They may call me any 
thing, provided I am called to supper," and so David 
started on. 

There is a deal of quiet humor about this corn- 
fed Diogones that is meat and drink to me. I re- 
member when the three months' service in the war 
came to an end at Camp Dennison, and my men were 
28 



330 Selected Prose Sketches. 

called to enlist for three years or the war, I made an 
earnest address about " the land we were fighting 
for," and ended by requesting the men willing to en- 
list to step forward. Only one responded, and that 
one was David Donald. 

" Well, captain," cried my one recruit, " g'ess if 
these other fellers all go home me and you '11 haf to 
lick the tarnal rebs ourself." 

A year after, I came from my tent one morning 
on the Gauly to find David on guard.. It was a cruel 
cold day in midwinter. The heavy clouds hung low 
over the rough mountain country, while a sleet drove 
fiercely down upon us. Dave brought his musket 
down with a bang, and, leaning on it, said, in a drawl- 
ing, melancholy way : 

"Well, captain, if this is the land we're fightin' 
for, I think we'd better let it go." 

There is a man who is noted as the meanest 
man alive by his neighbors. His close-fisted parsi- 
mony has passed into a proverb, and, instead of say- 
ing " Mean as Garbroth," the old expression, they 
now say " Mean as Smithers." 

Smithers is not his name ; but, with the warning 
before me of the fair author who did up Cape Cod, 



Murmurs of the Mac-o-chee. 331 

and the later example of Zola, I am disposed to be 
cautious. 

What a lively time Dickens would have had, 
poor gentleman, had this rule been applied to him. 
It is well known that he picked up both names and 
characters from real life. I believe, however, that, 
while he exaggerated the characters out of all recog- 
nition, he was careful not to fetch character and name 
together. It is traditionary that Shakspeare was 
given to the same practice. He deserved punishment 
more clearly for this than the mythical deer stealing 
he w r as said to have indulged in. And he would 
have had it but for the fact that in his pungent lam- 
poons on the stage the poor author and actor was 
considered beneath contempt by the rich and well- 
born whom they pilloried. They little dreamed, 
those aristocrats, that their names would be not only 
remembered through his terrible pen, but that it 
would be an immortality of shame and ridicule. 

My neighbor, Smithers, is a thin, stoop-shoul- 
dered, cadaverous looking old man, who impresses 
one with the feeling that the poor-house trustees are 
neglecting their duty in not furnishing the corpse 
with a cheap coffin and immediate burial. He is 
slow of speech, and in his various trades and busi- 
ness transactions wearies his dealers out with his 
slow-moving, slow-speaking w T ays. 



332 Selected Prose Sketches. 

Life possessor of a barren little farm, with a 
swamp for bottom land and knobs for highland, from 
which last the rains of heaven had long since washed 
the soil down to help bother Eads in his jetties, he 
lived alone, heaven knows how, until one day, years 
since, in the midst of the oil fever, it was discovered 
that from a spring on Smithers's place an oily sub- 
stance mingled with the water, and the wild cry of 
surface indications went out. 

A company of capitalists was immediately or- 
ganized, and every effort made to fetch old Smithers 
to terms. 

He proved to be the most aggravating old owner 
of an oil well ever found. He would take no risks; 
he could not be tied down to any proposition or pur- 
chase. His miserable land was worth absolutely 
nothing. It might have been sold for twenty-five 
cents an acre, and then swindled the purchaser. The 
company began at five dollars an acre, and then 
worked up to a hundred, and then gained the prop- 
erty only through strategy. 

One morning the old miser was alarmed by the 
information that oil had been discovered on an ad- 
joining farm, and the company had withdrawn all 
its propositions of purchase. This, as the president 
of the company said, " fotched him." His signature 
to a contract was obtained, and with feverish anxiety 



Murmurs of the Mac-o-chee. 333 

the old fellow awaited the payment, which was to be 
in full and in gold. 

The affair was consummated in the office of our 
blind Bismarck, of Bellefontaine, more endearingly 
known to the popular mind as Bill "West. He was 
the attorney for the company; but the venerable 
Smithers considered him as legal adviser also, and 
much time was lost in consultations about nothing, 
the old miser leading the lawyer out to ask but one 
question, and that was : " Now, Bill, is it all right? " 
or give but one caution of, " Watch 'em, Bill ; watch 
'em; all rascals, every one of 'em rascals; watch 
'em." 

When at last the affair was ended, and the glit- 
tering gold, after several counts, lodged in the old 
man's pockets, he took Bismarck to one side, and 
said : 

"Now, Bill, you've been my friend; you've 
stood by me, Bill, and I'll stand by you. I intend to 
pay you, Bill; yes, indeed; I don't want no man's 
time for nothing. I thought of that 'fore I left 
home, and you see I brought you somethin' nice." 

And the rural Shylock drew from his bosom 
three hen eggs, and laid them softly on the table be- 
fore the astonished attorney. Our Bismarck could 
see better in those days than he can now, poor fellow, 
and he was more in need of fees than at this time. 



334 Selected Prose Sketches. 

" Maybe, Bill," said the elderly Granger, seeing 
the lawyer dumfounded, " maybe, Bill, you 'd be 
willin' to take two ; now you kin make them oil ras- 
cals pay purty lively, you see, and I'm a poor man, 
Bill ; I 'm very poor." 

"Uncle Jake." said Bismarck, solemnly, "if I 
were to take two hen eggs for a legal opinion, and 
it got out, I'd be dishonored. No, I must have 
three." 

"But, Bill, nobody 'd know; P.m. such a poor 
man." 

" Can 't help that, Uncle Jake ; plank down the 
three eggs or I shall have to draw on your gold." 

This last settled the controversy, and the old 
man left the hen product and wended his way home, 
Bismarck had remarked that the one egg the old 
man kept his hand on was marked. The other two 
were not. Bismarck opened the window as soon as 
his penurious client left, and tossed out the ornitho- 
logical retainer. He discovered, as his neighbor did, 
that two of the eggs were spoiled; the only sound 
one was the marked product that the old scoundrel 
had hankered after. 

Uncle Jake bought a handsome bottom farm 
with his money, and waxed rich, of course. This 
business of accumulating lies more in the saving 
than the making. Old Smithers would have grown 



Murmurs of the Mac-o-chee. 335 

rich where even a Chinaman would starve, or a house 
dog grow rebellious. His miserly propensity grows 
with his age. The stories told of his grasping ava- 
rice — his intense meanness — make the average con- 
gressman appear respectable. 

It is said, for example, that, the wife of a neigh- 
bor having died, Uncle Jake walked over to console 
the survivors and learn when there would be a break 
up and a vendue, as such sales are called here. 
Smithers attended all such with the hope of picking 
up bargains, but never got beyond bidding off trash 
no one else wanted. 

The aggrieved family, assisted by a rural under- 
taker — the very worst sort of buzzard in human 
shape — layed out the corpse, and two pieces of money 
were called for to hold the eyelids. Such could not 
be found, and Uncle Jake drew slowly two coppers 
from his pocket for that purpose. 

" I can lend 'em to you, Brother Tompkins, 'till 
you find others," he said. 

The substitutes were not found, and Uncle Jake 
kept his keen, twinkling, hard, little gray eyes on 
the corpse. He went out hastily at last, and returned 
with two small, flat stones, saying: 

" I must be goin' now," and so he removed the 
two cents, replacing them with the flat stones, and 
then, with a sigh of relief, went home. 



336 Selected Prose Sketches. 

Of course such a citizen is very unpopular, and 
the whole country-side seems to combine to torment, 
and, if possible, cheat him. This last is not a pleas- 
ant operation. When the old man finds some one 
has the best of him, he turns his entire attention 
to restitution. As this consists in shadowing the 
sharper, almost lodging and certainly living at his 
house, the successful trader has either to quarrel out- 
right or make liberal restitution. 

A minister of the gospel traded a likely-looking 
horse to the old man — a horse better to look at than 
look for — he was moon-blind; that is, every thirty 
days the poor anirnaPs eyes turned of a milky color 
and sight left them. Uncle Jake remonstrated in his 
mild, whining way, to no purpose. Then came his 
old practice. $~ot only did he haunt the minister's 
house, but he tied the poor animal at the gate; and 
thus it was from morning till night, without food 
or water, staring with its moony eyes like a night- 
mare. 

On Sundays, Smithers became a regular attend- 
ant on divine service, and at intervals, when the 
prayer or discourse came anywhere near the trouble 
on the miser's mind, he would fairly shout out, 
"Amen ! " that at last set the younger portion of the 
congregation to giggling. 

After service, as the minister came slowly from 



Murmurs of the Mac-o-chee. 337 

the meeting-house, Smithers would sidle up to him, 
and ask, in a querulous whine, " How about that 
hoss, minister?" 

The poor man of God at last paid CJncle Jake 
ten dollars to take that horse and himself from his 
ministerial sight. 

The old fellow was not always, however, so suc- 
cessful. On one occasion he drove to Taylor & 
Fisher's warehouse with a load of wheat. 

" What yer payin' now, cash down, fur fust-class 
wheat ? " he asked. 

" Dollar five," was the response. 

" Must have dollar ten fur this wheat ; it 's fust- 
class." 

" Dollar five, old man." 

" Well, say dollar nine ?" 

" See here, Uncle Jake," said Mr. Fisher, " I am 
too busy to waste my time bargaining with you. You 
can take a dollar iive or move on." 

"Ain 't they a payin' a leetle more at the mills ?'' 
he queried. 

" I believe Armstrong is giving something more." 

Away went Smithers, but so slowly that a lad 
got ahead of him and gave the miller the hint. 

"*' "What 's wheat ?" asked the old man. 

" Well, we 're payin' dollar five, but they do say 
that they 're payin' more at the lower mill." 
29 



338 Selected Prose Sketches. 

This was a mile away, but the dealer " gee'd up " 
and dragged on to the lower mill. There he had the 
same response, to which was added that it was re- 
ported that at the Mac-a-chee mills wheat brought 
a dollar ten. To the Mac-a-chee mills drove Smith- 
ers, only to be sent to Moot's. At this old establish- 
ment he found a deaf miller, and the two yelled at 
each other for half an hour before the poor wheat 
dealer discovered that at Moot's mill wheat was not 
being purchased at all. 

It was about sundown when he appeared at his 
iirst starting place, his poor horses fagged out and 
the old driver hungry and tired. 

" Take my wheat," he cried, " at a dollar five ; 
I 'm tired experimenting." 

I am led to this screed by an affliction Uncle 
Jake practiced upon me yesterday, making my letter, 
I fear, a mail too late. I can comfort myself, however, 
with the reflection that it is no great loss, and with 
this humble confession sign myself. 

To my memory the country seems to have been 
as well filled with quaint odd characters as it was 
with game. Nearly every man seemed to have been 
turned out of a peculiar mold and shaped his life by 
an eccentricity of his own creating. I remember one, 



Murmurs of the Mac-o-chee. 339 

a mason, known by the name of " Old Gettysburg" 
from the fact that he began all his stories, mostly 
monstrous lies, with " when I was at Gettysburg." 
We boys fairly doted on old G. He could discount 
Munchausen and not try. 

" Now byes sot yer off eye on me," he would say, 
for example, filling his stubby clay pipe, " I 'm a 'goin' 
to tell ye about a big gun. It was a gun left over from 
the Resolution, a prime favorite of Gineral "Wash- 
ington's. It laid along side the road goin' to Gettys- 
burg. Well, one night I was a 'ridin' on hoss back 
sorter belated, and a storm come up. It was a big 
storm, I tell ye. The lightning flashed right along 
bright enough to blind ye, while the thunderbolts jist 
dropped about promiscous like, knockin' trees right 
and left, and the rain — well it jist come down in 
sheets. I suddenly recollected that cannon, and to 
git out of the storm I jist rode my horse in at the 
muzzle. I was about comfortin' myself when the 
stage coach come a thunderin' down the road and the 
fool driver missed his way and drove heltersplit into 
that cannon and killed his two leaders dead at the 
britch." 

"And what became of you ?" chorused the boys. 

" Well, I thought jist quick as a wink w T hat I 'd 
got to do, and I leaped my hoss out at the touch- 
hole." 



340 Selected Prose Sketches. 

Another favorite monstrosity he was fond of 
telling came up in illustration of his agility. The 
powder mills of Gettysburg caught fire. There 
was danger of an explosion that would destroy the 
town. He was at work topping a chimney a mile 
off. He immediately, with great presence of mind, 
dropped his shoes, descended the ladder and run that 
mile. He got into the mills and tramped out fifty- 
eight barrels of powder in his stocking feet and so 
saved the town. 

The old fellow's few introductory words came 
to be proverbial. When one began a fish or bear 
story or any other boastful narrative, he would be in- 
terrupted by a cry from some one " when I was in 
Gettysburg," and effectually silenced. 

* * 
The man, that to this day holds the affection 
born in my boyish heart was George Martin. He 
was what my father called a first-class chicken-coop 
carpenter, and evidently made by the day and not 
' by the job ' he was so slow not only in his work but 
all things. The time he took to eat was exasperating. 
He was longer in getting to sleep and certainly in 
wakening than any man alive. His gait as he moved 
was as if his limbs were lazily consulting each other 
as to long premeditated motions, while the sentences 



Murmurs of the Mac-o-chee. 341 

that escaped his everlasting masticated tobacco seemed 
to lounge out of his mouth. 

There was enmity between George Martin and 
one Mike O'Brien. This grew out of a theological 
difference. I never could discover that either had 
any religion, but while O'Brien was a stout Catholic 
to his finger tips, or rather to the tip of his shillalah, 
Martin had read but one book, and that was Fox's 
"Book of Martyrs," fearfully illustrated. Hence 
Martin regarded all Catholics more or less sons of 
Satan, and O'Brien as especially marked out for dam- 
nation. This he helped out by damning O'Brien on 
all occasions. O'Brien was not slow in reciprocating, 
and we were frequently favored with controversies 
that were supposed to be of a religious nature, but 
so hid under profanity that the theological intent 
was somewhat obscured, and especially was this the 
condition when the dispute ended in a fight — no un- 
usual occurrence. 

One Saturday evening a number were engaged 
near the saw-mill shooting at a mark. Martin had 
put down his loaded rifie to look at the mark and 
chalk the latest shot. While thus engaged, O'Brien 
came along quite drunk. It was growing dark, and 
had it been broad daylight, White's best, of which 
Mike had been partaking, would have obscured his 
vision. As it was he quite astonished Martin. 



342 Selected Prose Sketches. 

" Gimme a goon," cried Mike, and before he 
could be arrested he had seized, cocked and leveled 
the rifle. Poor Martin was bending over scrutinizing 
the holes lately made in the board, and thus presented 
a bright patch on the seat of his pantaloons, that 
Mike mistaking for the mark, aimed at and fired. 
Had he aimed at any thing else than Martin, he 
might have hit that great Hunter and theological 
student of Fox. As it was, Martin heard the crack 
of the rifle and at the same instant the- shrill whiz of 
the bullet. He left that locality immediataly. He 
did not wait to pass any whereas or resolutions. He 
could have given Lady Macbeth's guests a lesson as 
he retired beyond range. 

" Look at the dirthy baste runnin' away wid de 
mark," cried O'Brien. Nothing could convince Mar- 
tin that this was not a premeditated attempt on his 
life instigated by the Pope of Rome. 

* * 

Fishing is worse than hunting. Well, I don't 
know. I always thought the last application was 
the worst. Fishing begins the night before. The 
amount of preparation necessary is wonderful. What 
uncomfortable top-boots, what wretchedly fitting cor- 
duroy pants, and insane jackets are brought out! 
Then one is routed at midnight. The poor wife tries 



Murmurs of the Mac-o-chee. 343 

to be merry by caudle-light over the hot coffee one 
can not drink, and the hot cakes one forces down to 
cause indigestion and headache. Any fool can fish. 
I always felt like a first-class fool on these occasions, 
and yet I never caught any thing but a first-class 
cold and a ducking, generally both. Those top-boots 
always leak, and if they did not you are certain to 
slip up on a slimy stone and come down in a sitting 
position. 

I did catch something once upon a time. I had 
selected a pool directly above a rapid, and, throwing 
out my line, sat by the murmuring stream in a 
dreamy way waiting for a bite. My companions 
were off down stream following the current in a 
lively way, and in a few minutes, being exceedingly 
fatigued, I dropped asleep. I was suddenly awakened 
by a jerk, and to my amazement and some confusion 
I found the line around my neck and the fish pulling 
at it with terrible force was on land instead of in 
water. I extricated my neck from the sharp line 
that cut me like a razor by running up the bank in 
an undignified manner on all fours, and, to my in- 
tense disgust, found I had hooked a good-sized boar, 
that pulled and squealed and squealed and pulled in 
wrath and terror. The line was one of the best, light 
but strong, and, intending to pull the hook from the 
beast's nose, I took a turn of the line on my hand 



344 Selected Prose Sketches, 

and put out my strength. The hog was going at the 
rate, I should say, of thirty miles an hour, and the 
sudden jerk bringing his nose to the ground made 
hoggy turn a beautiful somersault. I must say that 
it was superb. It was pork over snout of the sweet- 
est sort. 

First knock-down for fisherman. 

My triumph did not last. The miserable beast 
regained his hoofs in a twinkling, and instead of con- 
tinuing his retreat turned and contemplated me. 
His reasoning faculties were certainly not so bright 
as Senator Harlan's, for example, but through his 
hoggish intellect went the notion that I had some- 
thing to do with his late disaster. As this original 
thought took possession of his beastly mind his back 
rounded up, the tail seemed to twist tighter to his 
animated hams, his jaws snapped, and with a snort, 
ere I was aware he charged in on me. I felt a thun- 
derbolt go between my legs, and, although I came 
down on my face, the astronomical observations that 
1 made of shooting stars were amazing. 

I regained my feet rather groggy, and before 
hoggy could renew his unpleasant attention I re- 
treated. He would have followed but for the happy 
accident of the line getting foul of a willow. And 
here a bright idea seized me. I ran to the side of my 
fishing station and got the landing net. I thought I 



Murmurs <rf the Mac-o-chee. 345 

could throw this over my enemy, and holding him 
down, cut out my unfortunate hook. I tried it on, 
and had the satisfaction of seeing the hog go through 
my net easily, if not as gracefully as Harlequin 
through a paper hoop. Enraged beyond endurance, 
I selected a handsome geological specimen of boulder 
of the drift period, and bringing it in violent contact 
with the hard skull, had the satisfaction of seeing a 
great geological triumph. Hoggy rolled over, kicked, 
tumbled and died. 

" By Jove, if you haven't killed neighbor Tom- 
kins' white Suffolk boar, that cost him three hundred 
dollars !" cried one of my companions coming up at 
that minute. 

Somehow or other we neglected to tell of this at 
the time, and left neighbor Tompkins under the im- 
pression that his valuable Suffolk Jiad come to his 
untimely end through a visitation of Providence. 

I heard a good thing anent one of our solid citi- 
zens that I can not help putting to paper. This 
solid citizen has a taste for liquid insanity, kept by 
apothecaries sometimes — and of all sorts of liquor 
he likes that best which somebody else pays for. 
Davy Gill, compounder of drugs, was called to the 
back part of his excellent establishment one day — 



346 Selected Prose Sketches. 

" Filled with deleterious med'cines ; 
All of whom partook are dead since — " 

And left the solid c. sitting by a counter, on which 
was a jar of old whisky. Davy heard the stopper 
clink, and returning saw the liquid yet being agi- 
tated. 

" Bless my soul," cried Davy, "to think of my 
leaving that jar of poison so exposed !" and seizing 
the whisky he replaced it on the shelf. 

"Vat?" exclaimed the culprit. 

" Poison ! deadly poison," responded Gill, gravely. 

" Mine Got ! Dafy, you don't make some mis- 
takes about dot ?" roared the solid c. 

" No mistake, old fellow — one swallow of that is 
instant death." 

The solid c. turned white in spots. " Dafy, vat 
vas it ?" he gaspe^l. 

" Virginicus nux vomicus, to kill bedbugs," was 
the awful response. 

" Mine Got, Dafy, I ish det as a log !" 

"You didn't?" 

u Yes, I did, Got tarn ! Yat I do right avays to 
once?" 

" Here, quick ! swallow this !" cried Davy, pour- 
ing out a glass of castor oil. The oil went down at 
a gulp. " Do you feel a tingling sensation in your 
toes and fingers?" asked the apothecary. 



Murmurs of the Mac-o-chee. 347 

" Yes, Davy, I tingles." 

" Shivers running up and down your back?" 

" I shifters all over." 

"And sweat?" 

" I sweats like a leetle pull." 

"The oil won't save you/' said Gill, solemnly; 
" you had better hurry to Leonard and let him pump 
it out." 

w The solid c. hurried across the street to Doc- 
tor Leonard. Fortunately for him the Doctor was 
not in his office. He broke like a quarter nag for 
Doctor Allen ; he, too, was out. The poor man was 
seen making for Doctor Hale when he suddenly dis- 
appeared from public view. An hour after Davy 
found him in Ed. Jackson's counting-room adjoining 
the stable. He was stretched upon a lounge, covered 
with robes and groaning. 

" How do you feel, old fellow ?" kindly asked 
the druggist. 

" Oh ! I'm det, I'm det !" he groaned. 

" No, you're not," said Davy, " I've been look- 
ing all over the town for you. I made a mistake; 
you did not swallow the poison — it was whisky." 

"Dafy," said the patient, throwing oft' the robes 
and rising, "you is a dam vools. I know all de 
times, dot vas whisky, an' I von't pay you a tam 
cent for dot casdor oil." 



Celebrated Men of the Day. 



Washington flfteltean. 

The death and burial of this remarkable man il- 
lustrate in a striking manner the singular condition 
of our community. No man, perhaps, wielded a 
wider and deeper influence upon the current of hu- 
man events at a period of a great social and political 
revolution than Washington McLean, and yet his 
exit from life was so unmarked by public demonstra- 
tion that the people scarcely knew of his departure. 

We have come in a strange way to measure our 
eminent men by the political positions they have 
held. That is, instead of the statue, we regard 
mainly the pedestal. All that is lofty and ornate in 
the base is alone considered worthy of our admira- 
tion. Having worked all that is of interest to us into 
party, we take it for granted that each political or- 
ganization puts into office its ablest leaders, and each 
party admires its own while living, and all lament 
unanimously the official dead. The private citizen, 
on the other hand, whatever his qualities and power, 

(348) 



Washington McLean. 349 

passes to the grave mourned only by his personal 
friends. When Washington McLean departed this 
life, to have had his merited share of public regard, 
congress should have adjourned and the departments 
at Washington been dressed in mourning. 

Mr. McLean, however, never held office; al- 
though frequently urged to accept positions by his 
party, he positively declined. He was wont to say, 
in his terse, incisive style : " It is the theory of our 
government that the official agent is the servant of 
the people. He is something more. He is the slave 
to public opinion, and can not succeed unless he be a 
base-burner for people to warm their feet at and 
spit on." He was not of that sort; and while active 
in shaping the policy of his party, and putting for- 
ward as officials men who could aid him in his efforts, 
he never trammeled himself with official obligations. 

In this way no one had a wider and deeper influ- 
ence not only on the fortunes of his party, but, 
through that party, on the country at large, It was 
Washington McLean, for example, who gave" the 
Ohio idea " to the country, and brought to the front 
— where he yet remains — " the Ohio man." 

My first acquaintance with Washington McLean 
was memorable. The precise year escapes my mem- 
ory, but it must have been away back in the thirties. 
Cincinnati was suffering from what was called negro 



350 Celebrated Men of the Bay. 

riots. They were in fact riots of roughs aimed at a 
handful of abolitionists. The negro was the bone of 
contention, and the bone took no part in the contest. 
The poor negro, however, was the sufferer in the end. 
To understand this condition we have to remem- 
ber that Cincinnati, although in a free state, was in 
feeling a Southern town. All its prosperity came 
from trade with the South ; and locally it had ties of 
as strong a nature that came of intermarriages, espe- 
cially among the more wealthy and influential. To 
be called an abolitionist at Cincinnati, in those years, 
was to suffer as great an insult as to be styled a thief; 
and to be caught helping a slave to his stolen free- 
dom was to be outlawed. If I remember rightly, an 
Englishman, a baker and candy-maker, named Bur- 
nett, was charged with, if not caught in the act of, 
aiding a family of slaves to escape from Kentucky to 
Canada. He was mobbed, his house and store were 
gutted, and the poor man narrowly escaped being 
hanged in the market-house, which then fronted his 
little establishment. Following this came a notice 
to the negroes and their friends, the abolitionists, to 
leave the town. The negroes not only declined the 
proposed exodus, but it was rumored over the city 
that they were arming themselves with the openly 
avowed purpose of resisting the proposed removal to 
the death. At the intersection of Broadway and 



Washington McLean. 351 

Sixth street, on the evening of the day these reports 
had been in circulation, an immense crowd assem- 
bled. The streets at that time were badly lighted, 
and in the gloom the masses swayed to and fro with 
a murmur of many thousands, in that subdued and 
angry hum which indicates a disturbed bee-hive or 
an excited mob. Sixth street, east of Broadway, had 
a sudden dip directly into the negro quarters of Cin- 
cinnati. " The crowd gathered more than elsewhere 
on the edge of a black gulf, and at intervals, after 
uttering wild yells, two or three hundred would start 
down the declivity ; but invariably the run dropped 
to a walk ; this soon came to a halt, and then the 
mob returned, yelling, with more speed than it had 
made the charge. 

About 9 p. m. several boxes were brought from 
stores near by, and a temporary platform was erected 
by the police and some prominent citizens, from 
which it was proposed that the mayor should read 
the riot act, and a number of prominent citizens ad- 
dress the mob with soothing words of promise against 
abolitionists and other disagreeable disturbers of the 
peace. A few glaring tallow-dips were being lighted, 
when some flashes of light and a discharge of fire- 
arms in the valley below, accompanied by a shower 
of small shot among the crowd, created a wild sensa- 
tion. The masses surging back along Sixth street 



352 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

upset the badly constructed platform, and in the hur- 
ried retreat carried the mayor and his riot act entirely 
from the scene of disorder. 

As no further reports of guns were heard, the 
crowd returned. It came back slowly and sullenly. 
In the dim starlight the faint gleam of guns, pistols, 
and knives could be seen. There was mischief afoot 
and a deadly menace in the air, when a diversion oc- 
curred caused by a number of men coming up 'Broad- 
way dragging after them a piece of artillery. The 
crowd opened to the right and left of the gun and 
squad. Reaching the center of Sixth street, the old 
smooth-bore was rapidly put in position, aimed in di- 
rection of negro-town, and fired. 

The effect of the discharge was ludicrous. How 
much soever the negroes may have been alarmed by 
that awful roar in the still night, and the rattle of 
iron clippings from a boiler yard — for such was the 
ammunition sent among their shanties — the effect 
upon the mob of whites was amazing. They incon- 
tinently fled along the three streets, and frightened 
crowds could be heard in the distance by a noise that 
resembled the tramp of flying sheep. I should prob- 
ably have accompanied the crowded masses but for 
the Hon. N. C. Read, one of the proposed orators of 
the occasion, who stood his ground, laughing at the 
absurd flight. I remained with him. The gun was 



Washington McLean. 353 

quickly reloaded and again discharged. When it 
was directed for the third time, the youth who 
seemed captain of the squad exclaimed : 

" Hold on, boys ; we must save our ammunition. 
The niggers may be on us any minute, now those 
cursed cowards have run away." 

By the red flash of the gun I had this captain 
photographed on my memory. He was slightly built, 
red-haired, with a handsome face, and certainly not 
over eighteen years of age. 

Judge Read approached the leader and said : 
" If those negroes do come out, my boy, you '11 be in 
a bad way now that your friends have run away." 

" They 're no friends of mine, damn 'em. I 'd as 
soon turn the gun on the cowards as on the niggers. 
But nig won't come out as long as we stay here." 

Nor did they ; in which instance they were as 
prudent as their late assailants. These last only re- 
turned after the then guileless police made up its 
anxious mind to go back and capture that gun. The 
police moved forward, slowly followed by the crowd ; 
but when the scene of action was reached the artil- 
lery had disappeared, and from that on all was quiet 
on this Potomac. As nobody was hurt, and no great 
harm done, the affair passed into the limbo of forgot- 
ten things, to be dragged out now that I may tell of 
.my first acquaintance with Washington McLean. 
30 






354 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

He was the captain of the gun-squad that had cowed 
the negroes while it dispersed so strangely the cow- 
ardly mob. But all mobs are as cowardly as they are 
cruel. Had the awful demonstration that darkened 
the heavens and shook the earth preceded the cruci- 
fixion instead of following it, our Savior had never 
been done to death. 

Washington McLean, born at Cincinnati in May, 
1819, was of Scottish descent, and of a family noted 
through several generations for intelligence and great 
force of character. They were Covenanters in creed, 
and Democrats from temperament and association. 
The boy Washington, after a brief period of school- 
ing, was bound apprentice to a boiler-maker. The 
business suited the youth ; he took kindly to it, and 
was scarcely freed from his service ere he set up 
for himself. It was a small beginning, but it pros- 
pered, and he was ere long sufficiently independent 
to marry a beautiful and accomplished Kentucky 
girl, who, from their union until his death, was not 
only his kind companion, but, with her tact, clear 
judgment, and winning ways, an element of success 
to her husband that can not be overestimated. 

In the young McLean a singular combination of 
character developed that grew stronger as life went 
on. There was not only that force whrch makes a 
leader among men in active life, but a turn for 



Washington McLean. 355 

thought that caused him to he a great reader of 
books. He had rare qualities in both directions. 
His singularly original views were as fascinating as 
his actions were forcible and effective. He had 
largely what we call, without comprehending it, mag- 
netism. He seemed to turn men to him without ef- 
fort. If to this we add one of the kindest hearts 
that ever beat, we have Washington McLean as he 
lived and died. 

However, words are feeble and almost unmean- 
ing when used to describe the great abiding quality 
of the dear friend found in his generous impulses. 
He gave not only his heart to whatever moved that 
heart, but the active efforts of the strongest nature 
I ever knew. This was shown not only when he 
moved the masses throughout the land to make one 
friend President of the United States, or beset and 
dominated the Senate at Washington to secure an- 
other friend his confirmation as justice of the Su- 
preme Court, but in his every-day life, where the 
humble and lowly appealed to him for aid. There 
was nothing weak or sentimental in all this ; it was 
the joyous, healthy expression of a strong nature. 
When his remains were escorted to the grave by a 
throng of eminent men, the cortege carried deep an- 
guish to a few and sorrow to the many, but over all 
the land were men who read the announcement of 



356 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

his death through tears, as memory brought to mind 
the acts of kindness in the distant past that made his 
life and theirs one and inseparable. 

"Washington McLean entered political life at an 
early age, and never till his latest moments on earth 
lost an interest in the pursuit. A patriot at heart, 
he was a Democrat from impulse as well as from con- 
viction. He sympathized with the masses, especially 
with labor. Originating from that class, he never 
lost touch with its hopes, feelings, and sufferings. 
No man ever comprehended more thoroughly the 
theory of our political structure, no man more earn- 
estly sought to hold it to the design of its immortal 
founders. He was in this so consistent and courage- 
ous that when the civil war broke upon us he was 
against coercion by the government, not from any 
sympathy with the South, but from his patriotic love 
of the Republic. a A government of states, based on 
fraternal affection, could not be pinned together with 
bayonets," he said; and when the war was over, he 
made the remark since attributed to George Pendle- 
ton: ""We have freed the blacks and enslaved the 
whites." His high intellectual force and strength of 
character made him the friend and associate of all 
the eminent men from Pierce to Chase and Stanton, 
and he influenced all for good. 

An event occurred in his earlier career that, in- 



Washington 31c Lean. 357 

significant in itself, colored and affected his after-life. 
In a heated contest in Hamilton county over an elec- 
tion for sheriff in which a number of congenial spir- 
its were thrown together, a quasi-political and alto- 
gether social club came into existence, called the 
Miami Tribe. Joseph Cooper, a popular leader, had 
been elected sheriff of Hamilton county. When he 
sought the second term generally accorded that offi- 
cial, he was defeated in convention by the machine, 
then in its infancy, that has since grown in its per- 
nicious spirit to dominate politics. This encroach- 
ment upon the old Democracy by a subtle and evil 
element was resented more from instinct than intel- 
lectual intent by the Miami Tribe. This was a secret 
association, with nothing to conceal but its existence, 
made up of the best men, lately bolters from the 
party on a nomination that had no political signifi- 
cance, and it was thought best that for the time be- 
ing their remaining banded together should not be 
known. It was an unfortunate mistake; for when 
the fact of its existence became known, the mystery 
that enveloped the club gave color to a multitude of 
lies put in circulation by the machine. 

Poor club ! Born in innocence, it died in the vio- 
lence of a mud-volcano, with a like effect. The press 
turned against us and gave long columns of assault 
in their brutal vituperation; while from the stump, 



358 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

in English, such as it was, and in German that 
sounded dreadful with its dismal refrain, " Miamis 
Thribes," we had a continuous torrent of abuse. The 
uproar was deafening. Fortunately the true list of 
members did not get to the indignant public. This 
fact enabled the more timid to join the enemy. 

" Look at our chiefs," cried McLean, " running 
into the tall grass to wash off* the war-paint. They 
will come out good Indians. Never mind, fellows ; 
keep horns locked and we're bound to win." 

But for our gallant leader we should have been 
run over and plastered beyond recognition in the 
mud. " Despair," he was wont to say, " is the refuge 
of fools." There is no assault that can be made on a 
man that he can not live down, if he has the courage 
to face it. I never knew a man who enjoyed a fight 
as did Washington McLean. I doubt whether he 
knew what fear meant. I remember his saying, " To 
test a man's ability, put a pen in his hand; to try his 
courage, seat him in a dentist's chair with an aching 
tooth." 

Looking over the roll of members, I am sur- 
prised to discover what a number of the Miami Tribe 
rose to eminence. I find them as members of con- 
gress, house and senate ; on the bench of the Supreme 
Court of various states and of the United States ; and 
in other high positions. The " Ohio man " was de- 



Washington McLean. 359 

veloped in the Miami Tribe. There are but three left 
alive, and the little remainder can well be proud of 
the old association. The tomb of each has an hon- 
ored epitaph in the name alone. 

No better illustration of Washington McLean's 
character and political ability can be given than in his 
putting forward George H. Pendleton for nomina- 
tion by a National Democratic Convention for the 
Presidency. Pendleton was McLean's pupil in pol- 
itics. An aristocrat by birth and early association, 
he was a democrat by tradition that had its origin in 
the South, where it was respectable to hold slaves 
under a JefFersonian dispensation. A man of ordi- 
nary power, he had a winning way that made him 
popular when known ; but that knowledge was not 
national, and when Mr. McLean willed that George 
H. Pendleton should be the candidate for the Presi- 
dency, the proposition was at first met with derision. 
Mr. McLean soon changed all that. His power of 
combination, his control of leaders, and his manipu- 
lation of the press were wonderful. And yet the en- 
tire Pendleton movement was from first to last under 
Mr. McLean's hat. I remember well when one night 
he came to my room in Union Square, New York, 
and asked me if I could get a strong leader into the 
Herald advocating Pendleton's nomination. I told 



360 Celebrated Men of the Bay. 

him I thought I could, but it struck me he wanted 
something better than that. 
"What is that?" he asked. 

"A severe attack on your man in the Tribune." 
" The devil! What do I want that for?" 
" On the principle that a man is helped more by 
his enemies than his friends. Your candidate is be- 
ing treated with contempt. He is sneered at and 
ridiculed. Let the Tribune make a serious assault 
on him as a dangerous, bad man, and all that will 
cease, and the Herald will take up the cudgel in be- 
half of Pendleton from a hatred of Greeley." 

McLean saw the point, and we immediately pro- 
ceeded to concoct a savage assault on our candidate. 
With much difficulty I got it in on the editorial page 
of the Tribune. The day after appeared in the 
Herald a defense of the much-abused Ohio politician 
and a pernicious assault on the guileless Greeley. 

The attempt to nominate Mr. Pendleton proved 
a failure, but it gave to McLean's protege a national 
standing which he carried from that out with force 
and dignity until his death. The two friends drifted 
apart in the later years of public life, and the cause 
of the difference has puzzled many. I think I com- 
prehend the reason. When Mr. McLean came to the 
support of his candidate, he did so more from shrewd 



Washington McLean. 361 

calculation of chances than from a friendly regard 
for his associate, believing, as he did, that, if the 
Northwest could be rallied to the support of a "West- 
ern man, he would stand a fair chance of election. 
Mr. Pendleton, feeling the effect of his advocate's 
masterly management, not only quietly acquiesced, 
but gave himself entirely to the control of his chief. 
This bred a condition not favorable to a continuance 
of the alliance, for Pendleton sought to use the prom- 
inence given him, and make political combinations 
naturally looking to his own advancement. With a 
politician this invariably means a conciliation of ene- 
mies. This, of course, counted out McLean, for, like 
all strong, positive natures, his hatreds were as bitter 
as his friendships were strong. He not only accepted 
his friends, but he selected his enemies with rare 
good judgment, and was utterly despotic in his rela- 
tions to both. The break between the two, McLean 
and Pendleton, was sudden, characteristic, and dra- 
matic. McLean heard accidentally of a dinner-party 
being under way at Pendleton's house. The guests 
were men McLean had been fighting in Pendleton's 
behalf. Seizing his hat, he repaired at once to Pendle- 
ton's mansion. In response to his card, George H. left 
the table and met his chief in the parlors. He ap- 
proached with his usual amiable look and extended 

31 



362 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

hand. McLean took no notice of the hand, and said 
abruptly: 

" Since when have you taken to entertaining my 
enemies ?" 

Pendleton flushed from chin to hair, and replied: 
" Since when have I accepted a master of ceremonies 
to dictate my guests to me ? " 

What might have followed is not hard to say; 
but at tha£ moment Mrs. Pendleton, a lady of rare 
grace and beauty, swept in and cordially invited Mr. 
McLean to join the dinner-party. There never lived 
a man who had more of the gentleman in him than 
Washington McLean. His manner changed magic- 
ally from wrath to amiability as he said : 

" Excuse me, Mrs. Pendleton, for thus intruding 
on your entertainment. You see, I got no notice of 
it. I had some business with your husband. But the 
business will keep ; it will keep, I assure you. Good- 
evening/' 

And so the two parted, never again to meet as 
friends. 

No better illustration can be given of McLean's 
kind heart and his influence with men of different 
politics from himself than what occurred during the 
war, when his old friend Roger A. Pryor was taken 
prisoner. This distinguished jurist and soldier had 
been betrayed into our hands by an act of treachery, 



Washington McLean 363 

and found himself assigned to the same embrasure that 
held Beall at Fort Lafayette. This man was charged 
with being a spy and pirate. He was no ordinary 
man. Colonel Pry or found that Beall had not only 
good social position, but much culture — was, in fact, 
a gentleman who, from zeal in the Southern cause, 
had risked his life in a venture where the odds were 
a thousand to one against him. Pryor heard BealPs 
story, and with his judicial knowledge and experience 
saw that he had a good defense if such were pre- 
sented by a capable advocate. Beall begged Pryor to 
appear for him. That the Colonel could not do ; but 
he wrote to Washington McLean a statement of the 
defense, and asked if a good lawyer could not be pro- 
cured to appear before the court-martial in the pris 
ener's behalf. Mr. McLean responded heartily. (The 
lawyer appeared. 

All efforts in this line proved unavailing. A 
court-martial is a body of gentlemen wholly unac- 
quainted with law, who sit without a bar or a jury, 
and find a verdict in accordance with the wishes of 
their superior officers. Beall's defense was soon 
brushed aside, and the finding consigned him to 
death on the gallows. 

From this attempted defense McLean appealed 
to the clemency of the Executive. President Lincoln 
listened with that patient attention for which he was~ 



364 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

so remarkable. To aid him in this call for mercy 
McLean got the President to send for Roger A. 
Pryor. "Within twenty -four hours that gentlemen ap- 
peared under guard at the Executive Mansion. With 
the ability of a practiced and successful advocate he 
at once entered upon an argument which began by 
showing that Beall had been illegally condemned, and 
ended with an appeal for clemency. McLean told me 
afterwards that Judge Pryor was extremely pathetic 
in his plea for mercy. There was riot an unmoved 
spectator in the room save the man he sought to move. 
The President listened, attentive, indeed interested, 
but untouched. He made no response in words, but 
poor Beall was duly done to death not long after. 

It is strange how strongly the belief has taken 
hold of the popular mind that Abraham Lincoln was 
a man so under control of his kinder emotions that 
he could not say no when these were appealed to. 
The fact is that, while good-natured in his ways, he 
was as firm as a rock in all that his better judgment 
dictated. A man of iron will and indomitable per- 
severance, he had no trouble from his temperament, 
which was of the coarsest fiber. 

He could not be influenced to intervene in behalf 
of the unfortunate Beall, but he did favor Hoger A. 
Pryor in a quaint and odd manner. Washington Mc- 
Lean having begged that Pryor might not be returned 



Washington MeLean. 365 

to prison, the President wrote on a scrap Of paper an 
order directing Pryor to report to John W. Forney un- 
til further orders. Of course Judge Pryor hastened 
to respond to this pleasant captivity, and was enjoy- 
ing himself hugely, when a sour old senator from 
New England called attention to this extraordinary 
treatment of u a red-hauded rebel." The President 
took the hint and suggested to Pryor that the sacred 
soil of Virginia would be healthier for him — and his 
absence a relief to the administration. 

Mr. McLean's influence in directing the current 
of political events was not confined to combinations 
that brought to the front influential leaders, but ex- 
tended, as I have said, to giving force and effect to his 
views upon measures that should govern the policy 
of parties. He was the author of the " Ohio idea " 
before stated, which held that the government credit, 
shaped into paper notes, was money, and no more 
limited by the supply of gold and silver on hand than 
yard-sticks and bushel-measures were. He protested 
against giving this money to banks, for such corpora- 
tions to contract or expand as their private interests 
dictated. He asserted that a greenback was a legal 
tender long before the Supreme Court of the United 
States so decided. I have no wish in a paper of this 
sort to enter upon a discussion of the merits or fal- 
sity of this proposition. I only refer to it for the 



366 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

purpose of saying that the storm which shook the 
financial and political elements from center to cir- 
cumference was one made potent by Washington 
McLean. What men it made and unmade, what par- 
ties it organized, and what parties it defeated or 
made notorious are now matters of history. 

Of medium height, McLean was strongly built. 
His trunk was in keeping with his massive head, 
while his intellectual outlook indicated his thought- 
ful powers and great force of character. Possessed 
of a keen sense of humor, it was yet kept subordi- 
nate to his earnest nature. He was remarkable for 
his epigrammatic utterances, many of which passed 
into general circulation. When asked once, for ex- 
ample, to join a club, he said: "No; do n't see the 
necessity of organizing to drink.*' Again : " The 
only club to which a decent man can belong is his 
own home. If a man can not find comfort in the 
society of his wife and children, he is no fit associate 
for gentlemen." Speaking of Stephen A. Douglas, 
when that gentleman was being brought to the front 
as a candidate for the Presidency, he said: "He 
won't do; his coat-tails are too near the ground." 
Of a prominent politician he remarked : " He is a 
one-storied fellow, with his eyes in the roof." One 
could fill a volume with such terse, incisive remarks. 

Washington McLean was of a deeply religious 



Washington McLean. 367 

nature, and there is a story afloat illustrative of this, 
which, if not true in fact, is true to character. It 
tells of his being seated in the reading-room of the 
Riggs House, Washington, and, looking out through 
the large window upon the avenue, made dismal by 
falling sleet, when he was joined by Robert G. In- 
gersoll. 

McLean knew the great Agnostic — which means 
a solemn old monkey that goes about protesting 
earnestly that he can not be expected to measure the 
universe with its tail : a praiseworthy confession that 
would be agreeable for so insignificant a fact, were it 
not uttered with such arrogant conceit, as if a short 
tail were a crowning merit. 

" You should have been here a few minutes 
ago," said McLean, " to witness a scene upon the 
street." 

" What was it? " asked Ingersoll. 

"A poor crippled veteran was hobbling upon one 
crutch across the street, when a young fellow came 
along and knocked the crutch from under him." 

" What an outrage ! " cried Ingersoll. " I hope 
he was arrested. He ought to be sent to the peni- 
tentiary." 

" Hold on," cried McLean. " What better are 
you doing? There are all about us poor old men 



368 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

and women, each hobbling through life on that one 
crutch of religious faith, and your pursuit in life is 
to go^ about knocking that from under the poor 
wretch. And yet you get indignant over my imagi- 
nary scene." 

The great characteristic of Washington McLean 
was his strong American nature. The cold Scotch 
blood of his ancestors had gathered warmth through 
many generations from the sun and earth of our con- 
tinent; and, while he retained the shrewd, brainy 
faculties of his forefathers, he had, in addition, a 
warm, generous impulse that was all American. His 
success in life illustrates strikingly our environments. 
Born a poor boy, and bred a mechanic, he won his 
way to great political power and social recognition. 
The friend and associate of our statesmen, he had a 
quiet, dignified ease of manner that made him at 
home in the most refined society. The paper cap of 
the mechanic that covers sterling qualities helps on 
instead of hindering success. 

Mr. McLean grew old gracefully. In an historic 
house on Lafayette Square that he remodeled into a 
beautiful home, he passed his declining years, sur- 
rounded by his loving friends and family. He re- 
tained to the last not only his well-stored mental fac- 
ulties, but the strong religious nature that seemed 



Washington McLean. 369 

born in him. If his native city of Cincinnati had 
enough repose from money-getting for memory, a 
bronze statue in the principal public space would 
commemorate Washington McLean as one of her 
most eminent citizens. 



370 Celebrated Men of the Day. 



Robert Gamming Sehenck. 

The death of this distinguished man can scarcely 
be called a loss to the public, for full of age and hon- 
ors, he has quietly waited in the privacy of his beau- 
tiful home for that summons which ends the world 
to each of us sooner or later. General Schenck grew 
old with grace and dignity, and when at last he 
folded his soldier's cloak about him and lay down to 
pleasant dreams, the mantle covered the form of one 
who had known not fear nor reproach. His name 
alone is his honored epitaph. His courage on the 
field was as high as the courage of his convictions in 
the political arena, .and while feared he was never of- 
fensive. He was at all times the true gentleman, 
and, while loving and lovable as a woman, he was a 
man among men, and to a high order of intellect 
added a force of character that made him under all 
circumstances a leader. 

General Robert C. Schenck had no luck. All 
that he gained in life came from the hardest efforts 
of his own against adverse circumstances. Brilliant 
as his career was, it yet fell far beneath his deserving. 
The writer of this, who was honored by an intimacy 
that made the confidence of brothers, looks back 



Robert Camming Schenck. 371 

from this cold March day, in which his remains are 
being solemnly laid at rest, to the far 1840, when the 
acquaintance began that soon ripened into a loving 
confidence which continued until death came be- 
tween, and can note each opening opportunity that, 
through a malign chance, was not taken at the tide 
which leads to fortune. 

Such, for example, occurred when President 
Lincoln was first called to the presidency. The then 
Hon. Robert C. Schenck and I were assigned to 
Southern Illinois to do missionary labor in behalf of 
the new-born Republican party. The region be- 
longed to the Hon. John A. Logan, and was called 
Egypt because of its dense ignorance. This was not 
all ; the ignorance had a spice of malice in it that 
found expression not only in epithets, but in handy 
articles of a rather malodorous sort. We learned 
that the American eagle sometimes lays rotten eggs. 
It was by the merest chance that the eloquent stump- 
ers in the cause of freedom escaped personal violence. 
Our meetings were large and disorderly. The enemy 
came in from a sense of fun and curiosity, and we 
had at each appointment a sturdy band of settlers 
from New England who acted as police and generally 
took the eggs. 

One of the amusing incidents of our tour through 
Egypt came in the shape of a curious combination 



372 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

made up of freaks, sick beasts, and second-rate saw- 
dust tumblers. The showman took advantage of our 
advertising, and was proving the greater attraction 
of the two. We found it necessary to get at an ar- 
rangement mutually beneficial. We agreed to alter- 
nate hours of exhibition. When the great moral 
combination of fat women, anacondas, invalid beasts, 
and spangled riders exhibited in the morning, our 
attraction in the way of oratory came off in the after- 
noon. On several occasions we occupied the one 
canvas, and when General Schenck or I stamped 
down our emphatic utterances from the roof of the 
cages, the sleepy lion or sick tiger would respond 
with growls that gave great emphasis to our oratory 
and delighted our hearers. My eminent leader 
charged that on one occasion he caught me and our 
hook-nosed showman dividing profits between us. 
This conclusion was erroneous ; I was only negotiat- 
ing with the showman for the use of the fat woman 
and the anacondas till the end of the campaign. I 
observed that our audiences so mixed the political 
efforts with the show combination that dead things 
and decayed eggs were less to be apprehended. 

Our canvass terminated at Springfield, where, a 
short time before the election, we spoke one night at 
the Wigwam, as the impromptu hall was designated. 
Abraham Lincoln made one of our audience, and the 



Robert Camming Schenck. 373 

next day, before we left, Mr. Lincoln urged us to re- 
turn to the jubilee at Springfield should the fierce 
contest end in our success. Such proved to be his- 
tory, and we not only had the verbal invitation, but 
were telegraphed for. At the end of the wild jubilee 
the President-elect insisted not only upon our re- 
maining, but in accompanying him to Chicago, where 
he went to meet the Hon. Hannibal Hamlin, Senator 
Trumbull, and others, to consult about the cabinet 
then being selected. 

There was no mistaking the significance of this. 
While President Lincoln was a cautious man, he was 
yet fair, and certainly would not have placed so dis- 
tinguished a man as Mr. Schenck in such an embar- 
rassing position without a motive. Mr. Schenck 
believed, not from any thing the President-elect said, 
but from his significant actions, that he intended ten- 
dering him a seat in the cabinet. When, however, 
we reached Chicago, Schenck and I making part 
of the President's family, influences were brought 
to bear that made such selection impossible. The 
fact is that it was at Chicago that President Lincoln 
struck that vast underlying mass of corruption that 
seized on and held the Republican party so long, to 
its embarrassment, and now, it is to be feared, its 
utter ruin. Robert C. Schenck was one of the purest 
men ever called to public life. A wrong-doing was 



374 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

not only a shock to his moral sense, but when it ap- 
peared before him, a personal insult. He was never 
tempted, for he had that in his presence which 
cowed dishonesty. This sort of man was not ac- 
ceptable to the element that was fighting to get Si- 
mon Cameron and Caleb B. Smith into the cabinet. 
Fraud was licking its hungry chops before the rich 
spoils which a new and untried party and a simple, 
inexperienced backwoodsman would have in keeping. 

Robert C. Schenck was crowded out. He felt 
hurt and indignant at the way he had been treated, 
and for some time after had an ugly-feeling for the 
man he had done so much to elevate. Indeed, this 
feeling lasted until the threatened war broke upon us, 
when all personal feeling was lost in the patriotic im- 
pulse of which Robert C. Schenck had so much that 
he saw nothing but the peril of his country. 

One can well be pardoned for speculating — idle 
as such is — as to what would have happened for the 
good of our country had Robert C. Schenck been 
called to the war department at that time. His 
clear, brilliant mind, vast stores of information, ex- 
ecutive capacity, and, above all, his high integrity, 
would not only have been of great service to the 
government, but have changed the whole current of 
events which, through four years of war, made a con- 
tinuous succession of shameful disasters and defeats, 



Robert Cumming Schenck. 375 

and the tracks of our armies highways of Union 
bones. We should now have something to pride 
ourselves on other than the heroic efforts of a great 
people, and the no less heroic fighting of the men 
under muskets, God bless them ! "When the cold, 
calm, impartial hand of true history comes to record 
our public shame, as well as our people's glory, it will 
point to the humble grave of the soldier and states- 
man at Dayton, Ohio, as holding a divine possibility 
strangely neglected when God gave us the golden op- 
portunity. 

Immediately at the sound of the first hostile 
gun, Robert C. Schenck tendered his services as a 
soldier to the government. The same strange fate of 
unfortunate circumstances met him at the armed en- 
trance. The president, accepting the offer, com- 
missioned him brigadier-general. Immediately from 
the Northern press went up an indignant protest 
against the appointment of what it pleased to call " a 
political general." It was our idiotic ignorance of 
the work to be done that made us regard a little 
school on the Hudson, that taught every thing on 
earth but patriotism and the art of war, as the only 
source of military ability. It was held that no man 
was capable of a military command who had not 
been perfected in the drill of a private, very much as 
if it were insisted that no one could ride a horse until 



376 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

he had learned to shoe the animal. All the lessons 
of all the wars, from the day of Cain to the death of 
Napoleon, failed to teach us that, while the private 
can be made through discipline and drill, God alone 
creates the capable commander. We can as well 
make a successful physician or an eminent lawyer 
out of a fool as we can organize a school that will 
monopolize military ability where the net purport 
and upshot of its course is to graduate abnormal 
memories. 

Be this as it may, it was General Schenck' s mis- 
fortune to execute a written order, word for word, as 
it was given him, by which a railroad train was 
wrecked by two pieces of chance artillery under 
command of a stray Confederate officer. Ten of our 
men were killed; and the wrath poured out in ridi- 
cule and grossest vituperation, upon the head of 
General Schenck was without parallel. It would 
have driven almost any other man from the service. 
General Schenck was a sensitive man, and I, who 
slept in his tent, saw the silent agony that made his 
days gloomy and his nights sleepless torture. But 
the brave man clamped those iron jaws together and 
went grimly on. No one unacquainted with the 
facts can realize the exquisite punishment so cruelly 
awarded him. Every day the newsboys, threading 
the camp of his command, distributed these poisoned 



Robert Gumming Schenclc. 377 

sheets, in which the awful butchery of the poor fel- 
lows, ten in number, was dwelt on as a fearful crime 
done by a political general. And General Schenck 
saw the unconcealed doubts in the faces of his men 
as he rode down their lines in discharge of his duty. 
How could he hope to win the confidence and con- 
trol the actions of raw soldiers thus influenced ? 

Another fact in this connection illustrates my 
hero's character. That order, which he was com- 
pelled to execute, was signed by General McDowell. 
At any time, by giving that order to the public, he 
could have shifted his responsibility to the shoulders 
of its author. He scorned any effort of the sort. 
The order was a correct order. What he was called 
on to do was the thing to be done, and he stood by it. 
He was not the man to use a baby's plea, and wail 
out a defense of that sort. 

As for General McDowell, who saw this storm of 
abuse hurtling over the land in condemnation of a 
gallant subordinate, when four little words from him, 
4i It was my deed," would have stilled the tempest, 
and yet said nothing, we can only point to the fact 
that a few weeks afterward he was called upon to 
abide the pitiless peltings of a like blast. In his de- 
feat at the first Bull Run, a battle planned and 
fought by him with infinitely more capacity and 
courage than was any engagement later in the war, 
32 



378 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

he met with, the most savage criticism and per- 
sonal abuse from this same press. However, the 
enlightened press began to see the fact, as the French 
philosopher expressed it, that " one can not have an 
omelette without breaking eggs." The lament over 
the poor dead of McDowell's railroad express died 
out before the stunning reports of defeats where the 
dead and wounded counted thousands. We can take 
up that refrain, now that the blare and glare of war 
have passed, and we can with a shudder count up the 
loss of life — God help us !— the lives of the bravest 
and best men, the men under the muskets, who 
marched to murder under epauletted imbeciles. I 
will not pause to enumerate these heroes of defeat, 
but I will say, as my old heart throbs with pride in 
the mention, that Robert C. Schenck was not one of 
them, nor old " Rosey," nor " Pap " Thomas, the one 
great hero of the war. 

General Schenck never recovered from the blight 
put upon him by an inconsiderate press. The Gov- 
ernment at Washington in every field fought two bat- 
tles, one the military, the other on the political field. 
There was an army at the North as deadly and dan- 
gerous as Lee's army at the South. At almost any 
moment when confidence should be destroyed, the 
grim and almost silent force in the rear was ready to 
move to the front and end hostilities through a com- 



Robert Gumming Schenck. 379 

promise that meant destruction to the Great Repub- 
lic. On this account the press had to be treated with 
profound respect. It is a great comfort to remember 
that this same press was like the people, loyal to the 
great cause. The press had condemned General 
Schenck very unjustly, but the verdict had been ren- 
dered, and from it there was no appeal. Talk about 
the infallibility of the Holy Father at Rome ! It is 
as nothing to the infallibility of our blessed autocrats 
of type, the imperial " we " of the press. 

General Schenck was never trusted with an in- 
dependent command until after he was shot out of 
his saddle at the second Bull Run, when he was ren- 
dered temporarily unfit for active service. Promoted 
to Major- General for gallant service in the field, he 
was given command of the Middle Department, with 
head-quarters at Baltimore. . 

My General was eminently fitted for success as a 
military man. He had not only the physical courage 
so much admired and believed in by the common 
mind, but a moral courage as well, that made his 
brain available in every emergency. After all, there 
is very little in this wholesale killing that calls for 
much intellectual ability. The self-confidence and 
force of character which distinguish successful mili- 
tary men are in antagonism to the thoughtful pro- 
cesses which tend to make a man doubtful as to his 



380 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

conclusions. However, let that be as it may, he had 
a taste for military life, and the natural qualities that 
gave him command on sight. 

In his diplomatic career General Schenck met 
with the same sort of adverse combination that 
seemed ever ready to leap up and face him when a 
way opened to fresh honors. Returning from a trip 
to Europe he saw at Paris a woman's hat, so beautiful 
that, under a sudden impulse, he purchased and 
brought it home a present to Mrs. Grant. President 
Grant returned the favor by making General Schenck 
minister to the English court. Fow, there is nothing 
of an official nature for an American diplomate 
abroad to do, and he has generally two secretaries to 
assist him in doing it. All our diplomatic business 
is accomplished at Washington, for the simple reason 
that there is no authority in our constitution by which 
the power lodged in the President and senate can be 
delegated to an agent. As a real diplomate is such 
agent, possessed of power of more or less significance, 
to commit his government to any negotiation he may 
be authorized to open, the door is shut to our ever 
having a diplomatic corps. Our agents abroad are 
therefore only clerks of the State Department, sent 
out on high salaries to play at being ministers, charges 
d'affaires, etc. It is well for these gentlemen that in 
their assumed role there is no business to transact, for 



Robert Camming Schenck. 381 

it is very doubtful if they could make much of a fig- 
ure if there were. 

However, there is a social side in which our clerk 
sent to England can figure, and, if he have the talent 
and tact, can do so gracefully, and to the credit, not 
precisely of our country, hut the gig society, as Car- 
lyle called the upper classes. In this way James 
Russell Lowell won renown, as did his successor, Mr. 
Phelps. General Schenck was eminently fitted for 
such a part. Easy, graceful, and self-possessed, he 
had a scintillating wit and a sense of humor that made 
him at all times acceptable to the cultured classes. 

Unfortunately my General carried with his com- 
mission a quantity of stock in what was known as 
the Emma Mine of Utah. He had not only pur- 
chased this stock in good faith, but put about all he 
owned in that venture. That the Emma was a most 
remarkable deposit, and bade fair to turn the thous- 
ands of the stock held by the few into millions, all be- 
lieved, but especially General Schenck. He put his 
own money in the mine, and in the generosity of his 
character he advised all his friends to do the same. 
Now, among these were some titled people, and 
therein General Schenck committed an error, for in 
time the rumor rose and spread that the Emma was a 
failure, and General Schenck was advised to unload 
ere it was too late. It was intimated to him that this 



382 Celebrated Men of the Bay. 

deposit was only a pocket, and would soon be ex- 
hausted. " I can not do it," said Schenck, " although 
its failure will ruin me ; I have advised too many of 
my friends to invest, for me take the course you ad- 
vise." He did hold on, and in the end proved a win- 
ner, for it appears that a few shrewd owners had set 
about freezing the majority of stockholders out, and 
having accomplished that, the Emma resumed busi- 
ness. But, as I have said, General Schenck had been 
guilty of advising certain noblemen of high degree to 
invest, and Squire Smalley, who stands at the palace 
gate armed with a syringe to protect the gentry and 
nobility of England from scurvy American citizens, 
opened upon General Schenck, and, assisted by Mon- 
cure D. Conway, evangelical teacher of evolution, 
supplied the American press with the vilest abuse of 
our minister for having been guilty of leading my 
Lord Tomnoddy and my Lady Teacaddy into a loss 
in the Emma. This vituperation was taken up and 
continued by the press until a man, the soul of honor, 
and of an integrity that kept him poor in places 
where he could have winked himself into millions, 
was regarded as a common sharper, and a discredit to 
our name. 

On one place, however, Robert C. Schenck could 
stand and ask no odds of any man, and that was the 
floor of the House of Representatives. He was 



Robert Cumming Schenck. 383 

probably the readiest debater ever seen in Congress. 
As Chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means, 
and, therefore, leader of the house, he would hold 
the floor and galleries interested for days at a stretch. 
His short, epigrammatic sentences, often enlivened by 
wit, and always forcible, irritated his opponents, de- 
lighted his partisans, and amused the spectators. 
He had the rare art of making dry details enter- 
taining. 

General Schenck was not a handsome man. 
Nearly all his life of a slender build, he had a short 
neck, prominently square jaw, and small eyes; and 
yet, with all these disadvantages, no man lived who 
could so readily win the love of women and the con- 
fidence of men. The smile on that grim face was in 
itself conquest, it seemed so sweet and devoted to the 
one on whom it beamed. He could turn a compli- 
ment in a way to rob it of any shade of insincerity, 
let the flattery be what it might. 

General Schenck's life was too busy — too closely 
pressed by live events — for him to be much of a book 
student. Quick to learn, he gathered all he cared to 
know from everyday life and the talk of men. A 
serious work that he might pick up, he seemed ,to 
master from the preface and index ; and all the time 
he had to spare to books he devoted to fiction. His 
political speeches, therefore, can not be taken as mas- 



384 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

terful essays on great economic subjects. He was the 
originator of many important measures, more prom- 
inently the bill he introduced and passed to a law, 
shortly after the close of the war, pledging the gov- 
ernment to a liquidation of the bonds in coin. The 
Hon. John Sherman gets the credit of this measure, 
and claims it. The humor of this lies in the fact, 
that Schenck devised this act, and hurried it through, 
in order to frustrate the Hon. John Sherman, who 
had then given in his adhesion to the greenback doc- 
trine of payment. 

Robert Camming Schenck belonged to a class of 
men once prominent, especially in the Northwest, 
that has almost disappeared from public life. I refer 
to men who came up from cabins and workshops, 
sons of farmers and mechanics, whose force of char- 
acter carried them from poverty to power. Knotty- 
headed, hard-handed sons of toil, they worked as la- 
borers in the summer for means to gain a schooling in 
the winter, and then taught school for a living until 
they gained professions. From this class came our 
successful business men, eminent physicians, lawyers 
of potent ability, profound judges, and popular politi- 
cians. In the last-named capacity they made the 
stump the tribune of the people, and were ready 
teachers of the masses. 



Robert dimming Schenck. 385 

This process of honest toil did not train thieves, 
and this class led in political life when not only 
marked ability threw luster upon our government, 
but to be a Swartwout was to be driven from place 
and from social recognition. For a man to be con- 
victed of bribery was as fatal to him as if he were 
caught picking a pocket. Henry Clay might fail to 
pay any debts save those of honor, and Daniel Web- 
ster in that direction might decline preference of any 
sort. But such wrong-doing did not touch their pub- 
lic lives. The people, dazzled by the ability of their 
leaders, were no less proud of their purity. Now, we 
have reversed this. So long as a public man meets 
his financial obligations promptly, he is not only al- 
lowed to practice crime as a politician, but applauded 
if successful. Even this line of demarcation is not 
preserved. As we make a detective out of a thief, 
because of his knowledge of thieves' ways, we set up 
rogues in each party to outwit rogues of the other 
organization. A Quay, for example, whose career, as 
told by the New York World, makes Dick Turpin 
respectable, is not only tolerated by a majority of the 
people of Pennsylvania, but sustained as the Repub- 
lican thief that is more than a match for the Demo- 
cratic thieves. 

" Had I a son," said General Schenck, not long 

33 



886 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

before his death, "I would rather see him a day la- 
borer than a politician." 

The distinguishing trait of General Schenck, in 
which he is most pleasantly remembered, was in his 
keen wit, that was stimulated and rendered delight- 
ful by his sense of humor. This was rendered the 
more fascinating by its unobtrusive use. He had the 
rare art of listening, in conversation, and rendering 
frank appreciation to the efforts of others. But that 
which made him more generally known was his be- 
ing so very American. He was the most marked ex- 
ample of our national character I ever knew. Born 
in many generations on our continent, he took up in 
each birth some peculiarity of our soil, climate, and 
other environments. This was shown in his intense 
love of his native land, which, in his eyes, had neither 
fault nor blemish. And this American character was 
shown in his happy versatility. He had in perfection 
the American hand that can be turned to any use in 
life or in emergency. As a lawyer he would have 
moved to the front of his profession. As a debater 
he had, as we have said, no equal. ISTo man living 
had a keener, clearer knowledge of details, and his 
happy facility in their manipulation made him an ex- 
ecutive official of rare excellence. As a soldier, I 
know of no man better qualified for the field. 



Robert Gumming Schenck. 387 

After a long life of honorable effort, much of it 
in the most stirring time of our country's peril, in 
which he took a conspicuous part, he has passed to 
rest, leaving to his loved and loving children a 
memory as precious as it is honored by his country. 



388 Celebrated Men of the Day. 



flewy (Hard Beeehef. 

The comment caused by the death of Henry "Ward 
Beecher affords means by which to gauge the impress 
made by that eminent man upon the community. 
Our people are much given to the measure of a man's 
greatness after death by the official pedestal upon 
which he stood in life. There is a popular supersti- 
tion to the effect that all eminence finds expression 
in official agency. In this way a member of the 
house has his elevation second to that of a senator, 
while a president towers over all. Now, as our gov- 
ernment, on paper, consists of a few rules easily under- 
stood, and not difficult of application, one would be 
puzzled at the infatuation that makes great men of 
its agents. This wonder, however, is solved when 
we remember that, while much of the wealth of the 
country depends on the administration of the gov- 
ernment, all of it is more or less interested. The 
brain, therefore, not only is not called in politically, 
but is actually excluded. The parties at interest 
want as their agent either a slave or a cipher, and, 
while there is no open organization against intellect 
and character, there is an instinctive inclination that 
is more effective. 



Henry Ward Beecher. 389 

" Why should I contribute money to carry the 
state election/' asked a prominent politician, " when 
I can buy the legislature for half the money? " 

Henry Ward Beecher held no office, and yet his 
death is as widely lamented as if he were an ex-pres- 
ident. Nor can this marked attention be attributed 
to religious feeling. This eminent man had no hold 
of that sort. He was a reverend in name, and the 
broadest so-called liberal known to the country. 
Born through several generations in Calvinism, the 
immediate son and trained disciple of the venerated 
Lyman Beecher, he seemed, at an early age, to have 
treated the dark, despairing doctrines of that sect as 
the average preacher does a text which we are told 
was like a boy who lays down a stick to see how far 
he can jump from it. Henry went on jumping until 
the old stick was entirely lost sight of. He con- 
tinued until he got to be, in his perfect manhood, an 
eloquent stump orator of the Lord instead of a 
closely-constructed advocate of what Burns called, 
profanely, " tyding o' damnation." He was a preacher 
of politics in the lecture-room, and a lecturer in the 
house of the Lord, and no man lived who wielded a 
wider and a deeper influence over his fellow-men 
than this strange compound of kind impulses, clear 
brain, and clever expression. He founded no sect ; 
he started no school; he had, indeed, no philosophy; 



390 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

but could put in choice phrase the kindlier thoughts 
and better feelings of humanity. Taking the little 
gold dust of the popular mind, he coined it into a 
circulating medium. 

To sum up, we are called on to consider one who, 
beginning a Presbyterian, ended an Evolutionist, and 
carried with him a huge congregation that went 
through the forms of Calvin's sect while listening to 
the teachings of Darwin's infidelity. The condition 
of this congregation of the Lord seems contradictory, 
but Henry Ward Beecher was consistent with him- 
self. Charity not only covers a multitude of sins, 
but it tolerates a large amount of absurdity, provided 
the absurdity is kindly expressed and in learned 
phrase. That the human race has been evolved from 
monkeys is as shocking to the common understand- 
ing as Calvin's darkest teaching of predestined dam- 
nation, but both monkey and devil disappear in the 
avowal of the loving mercy of the Almighty, and the 
subtle dissertations of philosophy. Henry Ward 
Beecher found no difficulty in harmonizing the two. 

This eloquent, kind-hearted, and impulsive man 
wielded a wider and deeper influence over our people 
and age than any other human being. Beecher was 
the architect and builder of his own fortune, and he 
came into the world singularly well equipped for the 
work. He possessed, to a wonderful extent, that 



Henry Ward Beecher. 391 

quality generally recognized and so little understood, 
called magnetism. To this he added the kind im- 
pulses I have spoken of, which impelled him to find 
in his associates opinions and feelings in which they 
could harmonize. This is a common quality, for men 
are gregarious, but he possessed the rare gift of mak- 
ing it practical. Of a sanguine, phlegmatic tempera- 
ment, he never offended by appearing better than 
others, or in anywise different from frail humanity. 
2Tor did he ever cry, Allez mes enfants, but Venez mes 
cnfants. He sent no forlorn hopes to attack the forti- 
fications of sin, but led in person, and took all the 
perils and privations of the expedition without pre- 
tense of any sort. His stout person, carrying a full 
stomach and a kind face, suggested good-fellowship, 
while his words were the utterances of genius used 
to persuade rather than threaten. 

The first half of his life he gave to the advocacy 
of reform ; the other and later half, to preaching the 
philosophy of content. Reform is not popular ; it is 
not respectable. All wrong shields itself behind so- 
cial respectability, and makes the reformer a low dis- 
turber of the peace. As an advocate of Abolition- 
ism, Beecher suffered. He was in a minority, and 
would have gone down with the odorous few, had 
not violence intervened on a different issue, and car- 
ried the cranks into a great party that, for the mo- 



392 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

merit, made the North one political organization. 
This success seemed to satisfy Beecher, and from that 
out he accepted the more pleasing rdle of Christian 
resignation to the ills of life. Wendell Phillips, on 
the contrary, having fought to free the negro slaves, 
sought to free white labor. Beech er seemed to think 
that white labor could care for itself, under the recog- 
nized law of supply and demand. The only duty he 
saw in capital was a charitable use of accumulated 
means, and the duty of labor was to be content " on 
a dollar a day," feeling assured that the dollar, in 
some shape, would be paid. He gave all he had to 
the poor and the gratification of his own cultivated 
tastes, and labored under the impression that such 
sort of life opened the road to heaven, closed by our 
Savior to the rich. " Sell all that thou hast, give to 
the poor, and come and follow me," had an implied 
condition that the believer was free of hay-fever and 
had no taste for bric-a-brac. 

As a reformer of evils and a reformer of men, 
preaching Christian content to one, and anti-negro- 
slavery to the other, he made a broad mark among 
men. The poor, much-abused Abolitionists rallied 
to his cry in the first instance, and broadcloth and 
fine linen gave him their ears and purses in the last. 
The forms of religion were retained in both. He 
preached political sermons between prayers all the 



Henry Ward Beecher. 393 

time. When advocating the freedom of the slave, he 
invoked the vengeance of God upon the slave- 
holders. When teaching the philosophy of content, 
he gathered about him the money-changers, and 
taught the Divine mercy of evolution between the 
same hymns and the same prayerful appeals, with a 
passage of Scripture that came in like a lump of old 
cheese to promote digestion. Undaunted by the 
memory of his stern father, Lyman Beecher, he could 
introduce Kobert Ingersoll to an audience, and stand 
unmoved upon the same platform with Father Mc- 
Glynn. This was being liberal, but it must have 
turned the venerable Lyman in his grave. 

It is claimed by a few, and thought true by 
many, that his usefulness in life was injured by the 
Tilton scandal. This is said and thought in ignor- 
ance of poor human nature. There is a point in a 
man's life when he reaches his zenith and descends 
on the same curve that marks his course heaven- 
ward. This lessening of power, and, of course, use- 
fulness, is attributed in Beecher's case to the ex- 
plosion of that mud volcano. It is a startling as- 
sertion to make, but I believe the truth, that Beecher 
gained instead of lost by that assault. In this I do 
not claim that his innocence was proven, or that the 
white soul came out of the fiery furnace untarnished 
and unmarked by the flames. The contrary was the 



394 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

fact. The only question debated, in mind among his 
friends, and openly by the public, was his degree of 
guilt. His followers stood by him bravely as too 
good and dear a man to be put down, even by his 
own act, while the people sympathized with him in 
wrong-doing, which is only an unforgiveable sin 
when committed by a woman. Joseph is sneered at, 
while the wanton Mrs. Potiphar is consigned to sev- 
eral thousand years of infamy. 

This is not a delicate subject ; it is simply indel- 
icate, and the dudes of literature are shocked into 
silence by its mere mention. As morbid anatomy we 
may show sickening specimens, or leave them to 
science for treatment. But this is not morbid an- 
atomy; it is poor human nature in its normal condi- 
tion, and a shame to our civilization. The difference 
of treatment awarded the man and the woman for 
the same transgression reflects upon men and women. 
The sister of the one when even charged with the 
sin is consigned to infamy by the sex that is without 
forgiveness cruel as fate, while both join in admira- 
tion, either secretly felt or openly expressed, for the 
sinful man. Had the woman told of in Holy Writ 
been surrounded by women, our blessed Savior would 
have found his hearers with aprons, yes great baskets, 
filled with stones, and e'er the Divine injunction 
could have been uttered, the Son of Man would have 



Henry Ward Beecher. - 395 

been forced to flee for his life, for not only is the 
woman doomed, but all who dare to pity and forgive 
her. In this case of protected trial, grotesque and 
comic in many aspects, and tragic in one only, 
Beecher escaped unharmed, while poor Mrs. Tilton 
lies buried fathoms deep beneath the slime of the 
eruption. 

Again we are so strangely obtuse to the fact that 
while our admiration may be excited by intellectual 
qualities, or the power that comes of force of char- 
acter, our sympathies are based wholly upon the hu- 
man weakness of the hero. In the silly anxiety to 
construct of George Washington, for example, a demi- 
god, undimmed by faults or failings, that great man 
is robbed of the loving memory that should be his. 
These pious eulogists are worried to find that people 
weary of their wooden god. The sculptor who left 
him of heroic size, in marble, at the capitol, sitting in 
stern majesty, half naked, " looking," as the witty 
Ben Lesley Loose said, " as if he had risen from a 
cold bath, and was pointing indignantly at the patent 
ofiice, where his small clothes were," was not fur- 
ther from the truth than the pious exhorters who 
have eliminated all humanity from our hero. 

I have said that there was no question in the 
minds of the mass as to the guilt of Beecher. The 
verdict was a Scotch verdict of "Not proven." But 



396 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

there were degrees of mental conviction. To the 
vulgar he was a common debauchee, and was loved 
the more on that account. To the discriminatinsr 
there was a familiarity with vice and the vicious in 
that direction that was not commendable, to say the 
least; but they attributed this to his good-natured, 
easy indifference that permitted questionable char- 
acters to sleep in his priestly robes. This was a 
weakness, but not a sin. 

The fact is Beecher was a born Bohemian. The 
shallow pretenses, the hypocrisy of social life when 
respectable, made him tired. He longed to throw off 
the unnatural restraint and feel at liberty. In this 
way he opened a back door to a class of emancipated 
mortals, whose very freedom afforded him relief and 
amusement. These people were learned, witty, and 
by no means common people, and they flattered the 
man whom their mere association first endangered 
and then damaged. But the man thus abused was 
not permanently injured. He had a strong hold on 
the people through love for him, and he won their 
admiration through his courage. 

The fact is, no man in this world of ours lives by 
the consent of others, unless he is charged with mur- 
der, and then twelve men may hang him. Men suffer 
death politically, socially, or otherwise from their 



Henry Ward Beecher. 397 

own acts. It is the breaking down of the inner man 
in the presence of abuse that is fatal to him. 

The great Lincoln taught me a lesson in this. 
During the war I met the Hon. Reverdy Johnson of 
Baltimore, near the executive mansion, and he in- 
formed me that he was on his way to see " Old Abe," 
as he called the President, on some business. Invited 
to accompany him, I turned, and we found the Presi- 
dent alone, seated at a table, studying a number of 
maps. Inviting us to sit, he said : 

"We 're trying, gentlemen, to get McClellan off 
the James, and do you know the difficulty reminds 
me of two bulls fighting. So long as the animals 
keep their heads down, tails up, and their horns 
locked, there is a good deal of unseemly noise, but no 
harm done; but the moment one turns to run, the 
other rips his behind open." 

The Hon. Reverdy, a man of a rare sense of hu- 
mor, laughed immoderately at this homely, yet apt, 
illustration, and some distance from the White House 
said soberly : 

" Do you know that bull story is equal to any- 
thing in ^Esop? It illustrates more than the armies. 
I have often observed that when a man is assailed by 
his enemies, so long as he keeps his head down and 
his horns to the front, he is not hurt, and if he has 
the staying power, as well as pluck, he can not be 



398 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

injured. The people worship courage, while a sense 
of fair play, common to us all, comes in after a time 
to the aid of the poor fellow." 

Returning from Europe, some years after, I en- 
countered the late Hon. Matt. Carpenter, the mast- 
fed Webster of the West, in the smoker of a train 
bound for Washington. I found this able, noble- 
hearted senator in a state of deep despondency. He 
had offended two journalistic reporters by being in- 
strumental in having them imprisoned for stealing a 
copy of a treaty held in executive session of the 
senate, and he had not butted one locomotive alone, 
but all the locomotives in the country. The abuse 
poured on his poor head was intolerable, and he told 
me he was on his way to Washington to prepare for 
his resignation as senator. " There is but one office 
I want," he said, " and that is a law office." 

I told him that would not do, and recalled Lin- 
coln's bull story, with Eeverdy Johnson's moral, and 
added : " Try and fight it out. This storm can not 
last much longer; it is getting weaker now. After 
it is over, make one of your brilliant speeches in the 
senate, on the popular side, and you can go out in a 
blaze of glory." Carpenter practiced as I preached, 
and the trouble about his retiring was that neither 
his own state, nor the party the country over, would 
permit him to retire. 



Henry Ward Beecher. 399 

Henry Ward Beecher fought it out. If his cour- 
age at any time failed him, he kept the failure to 
himself. With a calm, quiet and almost indifferent 
front he faced the enemy, until, amid the cheers of 
the crowd and congratulations of his friends, the 
enemy disappeared. 

Henry Ward Beecher did much writing, hut 
never appeared at his best either as author or jour- 
nalist. He had the divine faculty of thinking aloud 
on his legs, and moving masses to laughter or tears 
at his will. While blessed with a charming utterance, 
and winning his way through words that for the mo- 
ment seemed inspired, he lacked the imagination nec- 
essary to successful authorship, and his books will 
make but a feeble record of his power. He was a 
successful actor, and as such will live through genera- 
tions on tradition, while the flowers so profusely cast 
by his friends upon his coffin will fade into nothing- 
ness, and the inscription on his tomb will require ere 
long a memory to tell of who he was and what he 
accomplished. 



400 Celebrated Men of the Day. 



tyoseoG Go&kling. 

How few are the orators capable of burying 
Csesar, as compared to the number prepared, to praise, 
the late Mark Antony and the living Ingersoll illus- 
trate. 

Death not only challenges effort, but in its dread 
mystery evokes sorrow and sympathy. It is a great 
misfortune to die, and the surviving friends and rela- 
tives seek consolation in tears and praise that are 
equally vain and senseless. The poor unfortunates 
have condensed eulogies engraved on their tombs, 
while the more conspicuous are treated to orations, 
and, 

" When all is done, upon the tomb is seen, 
Not what they were, but what they should have been." 

In the burial of our latest Caesar, it was well 
that the pagan Ingersoll should be selected to eulo- 
gize the dead. To bury Csesar is to pot body and 
character alike out of sight. To praise is not to 
bury the past, with his bones, but to call the spirit 
from its forgetfulness, and keep alive its character 
and career among the living. Our pagan orator has 
little logic and less imagination; but a delicate fancy 



Boscoe Conkling. 401 

plays upon the surface, like sunlight on water, leav- 
ing all the depths untouched and undisturbed. Out 
of the dead Conkling he constructed a great shade 
that has about as much resemblance to the original 
as the fantastic folds of a fog-bank have to the marsh 
from which it originated. 

Through all the glittering sentences of the ora- 
tion we look in vain for some proof that the dead 
politician was a statesman — or an orator. No meas- 
ure is told of that he originated or sustained for the 
betterment of the masses he represented; no one sen- 
tence is recalled, of all the speeches, that humanity 
cares to remember. 

He was an honest man, cries our pagan orator; 
and it is a sad commentary on our civil service that 
the highest praise awarded a dead official is that he 
died poor. Have we come to such a pass that a man 
holding high honors, who failed to take advantage 
of his trust and so rob the public to fill his private 
purse, leaves this as his only claim to memory ? 
Such is the fact ; and no man did more to fetch upon 
us this deplorable condition than the dead Csesar the 
orator Ingersoll would not bury. 

We were content to have had the wreaths fade 

and the moss grow upon a tomb, to dumb forgetful- 

ness a prey, wherein were hid the evil deeds of a 

noted character ; for Eoscoe Conkling had been for 

34 



402 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

many years out of public life. But to have this pict- 
uresque but exceedingly unpleasant person held be- 
fore the people as a model of excellence is more than 
our sense of propriety will allow. To speak ill of 
the dead means a wanton assault on a memory; and 
after all, the late 1ST ew York politician did not orig- 
inate the wrong he made crime, but only practiced 
upon a system he found ready to his unscrupulous 
hand. We could well leave the grave to hide the 
evil he had done, in the memory of what he might 
have been with other environments, but we can not 
consent to this mischievous attack on the integrity 
of a memory that yet lies within the memory of the 
living. 

Roscoe Conkling was an honest man, if by hon- 
esty we mean the clean hands with which he left 
public life. And yet no man ever lived who covered 
with his eloquence and concealed behind his high 
character so much impurity. Too proud to steal 
himself, he was not too pure to wink at theft in oth- 
ers. He was not only willing his henchmen and 
allies should steal, but he hastened to shut off all in- 
vestigation and protect criminals from being made 
convicts, and convicts from being punished. Of 
course this eminent man would have scorned to de- 
fend a commen fence for vulgar stealings ; but when 
the administration itself, in the hands of the highest 



Roscoe Conkling. 403 

officials of the best government under the sun, went 
into the business, the elevation of the criminals lifted 
crime into respect, and the senatorial robes could be 
spread unsoiled to cover and conceal the swag of an 
administration. 

All this was not without compensation. The 
able advocate who, returning to practice at the bar, 
made a fortune every year in retainers alone, by 
pleading cases before judges of his own creation, was 
not the man to make a present of his powers as an 
advocate to a combination that was as heartless as it 
was unpatriotic and corrupt. 

God knows Grant's administration needed not 
only such a defender, but precisely such a bold, un- 
scrupulous leader. It was his task to marshal and 
hold to the front the Republican party in Congress. 
There were a few conscientious men there who sick- 
ened at the corruption ; and there were many timid 
men there who were startled at the half-hidden mines 
of dynamite over which they were called to march. 
Conkling inspired the one with courage and the other 
with confidence. 

This was a huge contract, an undertaking that 
might well appall a less resolute and more conscien- 
tious man. "We came out of the late civil war with 
three armies left over for the government to care for. 
One was an army of thieves, the other of prostitutes, 



404 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

and the third of cripples. All three of these armies 
moved on the capitol. They found in command 
there the man who, being considered the greatest 
captain of his century, from the fact of his being on 
horseback when the confederacy fell from sheer ex- 
haustion, had been made a political platform of, and 
ruled the country as he had the army, on a principle 
that made the justices of the Supreme Court mem- 
bers of his staff, and members of Congress his sub- 
ordinate officers. 

Under this system of administration, so ignorant 
that it almost defies belief, fraud ran riot, and the 
foulest corruption sapped the very foundations of the 
solid political fabric erected by the fathers. The cor- 
ridors of the capitol were crowded with a lobby made 
up of fast men and loose women, upon whose ada- 
mantine cheeks iniquity was fairly enameled. The 
departments were given over to cunning schemers, 
who depleted a treasury filled to overflowing by a 
war tax that had kept a million of men in the field. 
At the executive mansion the very air was heavy 
with a sewer-gas of moral corruption, and the cabi- 
net itself was embarassed by penitentiary liens upon 
its members. 

From all this foul environment Roscoe Conkling 
walked apart. No lobbyist, nor dishonest contractor, 
nor fraudulent official dared approach him. He held 



Koscoe Conkling. 405 

a position where he could have winked himself into 
millions. He had that strange personality and pride 
of character that made the slightest intimation of 
personal wrong-doing an insult. And yet this did 
not prevent his defending wrong in others. He, how- 
ever, illustrated the truth of Walpole's misquoted 
saying, which tells us that every man has his price. 
Conkling's price was political power, and it was 
freely given him. 

No prominent man ever lived so poorly equipped 
to be a popular leader as Roscoe Conkling. To the 
vanity of a woman he added a manner at once so of- 
fensive and aggressive, that it was said of him that 
he made an enemy whenever he shook a hand. And 
yet these very qualities gave strength to the control 
awarded him in a corrupted civil service by the Presi- 
dent. In return for his support of the administration 
he was given full, unrestrained, and complete control 
of the patronage of New York. His constituency 
was shifted from New York to the executive man- 
sion. His adroit colleague from New York was so 
amazed to find the atmosphere about the President 
so chilly, and his recommendations treated with such 
contempt, that he was forced from office. Official 
patronage is the breath of life to a senator, and 
Conkling's associate had to be a slave or a cipher in 
order to hold his empty honors in the chamber. 



406 Celebrated Men of the Day. * 

Such was Conkling's hold on Grant that his 
brother-republican senators feared to offend him; for 
they saw but too clearly that when a senator refused 
to acknowledge his imperious leadership, political 
death was that senator's immediate fate. Thus it 
was that Sumner found himself deprived of his sena- 
torial prominence, and Carl Schurz was relegated to 
private life. Detested by the Democrats, distrusted 
by the Republicans, and feared by all", yet such was 
the power of the patronage given to his especial use, 
that he stalked the chamber with the pride and inso- 
lence of a dictator, and marshaled his forces as if 
they were slaves dreading the crack of a whip. And 
he won his spurs. !No scandal drifted near th'e White 
House, no attack by reformers or Democrats threat- 
ened the Executive, that Roscoe Conkling did not 
start up, gun in hand, to repel the threatened danger. 

When, for example, the San Domingo infamy 
reached the public, and it became known how a com- 
bine had bought for a mere song a rotten debt of a 
negro government, and sought through annexation to 
fetch their bonds to par, Sumner assailed it; and 
while Conkling's resonant voice was echoing along 
the fretted ceiling of the senate chamber, the Presi- 
dent of the United States occupied the lobby, hat in 
hand, using his personal influence to force the infamy 
through. 



Roscoe Conkling. 407 

In like manner the French arms outrage, sanc- 
tioned by Grant and sustained by Conkling, was 
fought over in the senate. But five hundred pages 
would not serve to tell of the iniquities conceived at 
one end of the avenue and concealed under thunders 
of eloquence at the other. Roscoe Conkling could be 
awakened at midnight not only without offense, but 
eager for the fray. He paid well for the corrupted 
use of official patronage given without reserve into 
his hands. 

We have said he was distrusted by his Republi- 
can associates and detested by all. That the distrust 
was not without foundation, his conduct in the Tilden- 
Hayes contest abundantly justifies. Conkling saw 
Grant's term of office drawing to a close, and well- 
knew that Grant's successor could not be depended 
upon for a constituency. If he had any doubt of this, 
the nomination of Hayes at Cincinnati solved it be- 
yond question. The cold, quiet, self-possessed, po- 
litically unknown man of Ohio was the equal of 
Conkling in intelligence, and his superior in force of 
character. Modest of manner, he was yet self- 
possessed and positive in his personality. He was 
not the man to be the tool of the moneyed combina- 
tions about "Washington, nor dependent on any man 
in the senate for a vindication of character or career. 
Conkling could not afford to have such a Republican 



408 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

succeed the rough, ignorant soldier who had so long 
served him as a constituency. Roscoe could afford to 
have a Democrat President, as in that case he could 
put the Executive between himself and his humble 
office-holders and office-seekers, 

Now, had Roscoe Conkling risen in his place in 
the senate and denounced the purposed inauguration 
of Hayes as an infamous outrage, he would have won 
for himself all that Ingersoll has uttered in his eu- 
logy. He did nothing of the sort, but, continuing in 
caucus with his Republican associates, he intrigued 
with the Democracy to the ruin of his friends. He 
was the author of the electoral bill that meant the 
Hon. David Davis to hold the casting vote ; and so 
clear were his tracks and ill-concealed his motives, 
that a Republican senate treated him to the dis- 
courtesy of refusing him a position on the very com- 
mission he had conceived of and carried through to 
a law. 

During Hayes' administration, the shadow of the 
picturesque senator never darkened the doors of the 
executive mansion. % Under the rule of the Ohio law- 
yer the moral atmosphere cleared, and the moneyed 
combinations disappeared from about the depart- 
ments. They lingered about the lobbies of congress 
in a shame-faced sort of way, lacking the sanction of 
the Executive and the support of senatorial eloquence. 



Roscoe Conkling. 409 

St. Edmunds came to the front, and, sustained by the 
ample cloak of philanthropy that covered the class 
legislation of a paternal government and in the name 
of God robbed somebody, Conkling's occupation 
seemed a dream of the past. 

Eoscoe Conkling's exit from public life was in 
keeping with his startling career. Restless under the 
loss of power, he conceived the violation of our un- 
written constitution in a third term of Grant. His- 
tory tells how this was defeated by Blaine and en- 
joyed by Garfield. We all know how the Achilles 
sulking in his tent was brought to the field by a sol- 
emn compact that was to restore the able politician to 
his breath of life — his source of power found in the 
official patronage of the great State of New York. 
This compact was violated in the selection of James 
G. Blaine as Secretary of State. That selection sealed 
the doom of both the President and Conkling, for the 
resignation of one was followed by the assassination 
of the other. The senator of a sovereign state threw 
up his high office because he could no longer control 
the patronage found in a rotten civil service ; and the 
crack of an assassin's pistol told the world that our 
civil service, steeped to the chin in corruption, had 
culminated in murder. 

Of course no sane mind connects Conkling, di- 
rectly, with the crime of Guiteau; and yet the re- 
35 



410 



Celebrated Men of the Day. 



volver fired at Washington was loaded at Utiea. 
Fraud breeds violence, and the men who plot treason 
against good government are sure to find some one, 
more zealous or insane than the rest, to put their 
scheming to the proof of expression in act. 

This is the story of Conkling's public career, and 
it finds significance in being the story of our civil 
service. Are the good citizens of the great Republic, 
who seek to send down to their children's children 
the blessings of self-government, prepared to con- 
done the fearful wrong, because of a sickly senti- 
mentality that would bury in one narrow grave all 
memory of a crime that covers a continent in its evil 
consequences ? 



Charles Stewart Parnell. 411 



Charles Stemart Parnell. 

When the startling news of ParnelPs sudden death 
went abroad, it was accompanied by the rumor that he 
had committed suicide. This, in the shape given by 
report, proved untrue, and yet in a certain sense it was 
the truth. He had committed the suicide of crime, 
and what followed, in the loss of moral life, and later, 
in the end of his physical existence, were but inevit- 
able results. So long as Charles Stewart Parnell 
stood in the sunlight, before the world, with clean 
hands and a clear conscience, he was not only the 
uncrowned king of Ireland, but one of the most con- 
spicuous figures in all Europe. He was second only 
to Bismarck, and it is doubtful, if the Iron Duke had 
faced such obstacles as those with which Parnell had 
to contend, he could have left the German Empire 
as an immortal monument of his fame. 

The task given Parnell was to harmonize Ireland 
before attacking the most powerful government on 
earth. The history of Ireland, up to within ten 
years, was an awful record of internal dissension. 
Irish impulse was Irish insanity. A state of nature 
seemed a state of war. It was said of them that 
they fought every nation's battles but their own. 



412 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

How they were taught to know themselves, and in 
that knowledge learn their strength, is the record of 
Parnell's great work. All after came easy. 

To comprehend this, one has to know an Irish- 
man. For good or ill he is irrepressible. The only 
disposition that can be made of a turbulent Irishman 
is to kill him, said the English oppressor, and there 
was much truth in the observation. The attempt to 
get rid of him through migration proved a failure. 
He was as dangerous and troublesome in the United 
States as at home. Indeed, the immigrant was more 
of a menace here than at home, for with us he made, 
through the value of his vote, our government hos- 
tile to Great Britain, while at home, broken into 
factions, he fought other Irishmen. 

Parnell stilled this sea of strife, and, for the first 
time, brought a great people into position to demand 
what heretofore they had pitifully sued for. The 
little island is so close to England, that to hold it as 
an alien enemy is to cultivate a cancer in the stom- 
ach. When, therefore, the entire people of Ireland 
came to the front, it chilled " jingoism " to the bone, 
and made a quality that entered into the negotiations 
of every treaty the world over. Russia's road to 
India, for example, laid through Ireland. The min- 
istry of Her Gracious Majesty brought Parnell from 
jail to the house of commons, and begged to know 



Charles Stewart Parnell. 413 

his terms. Any other leader would have compro- 
mised with wrong, taking one-half, but Parnell de- 
manded a home rule that had a parliament at its 
head and the constabulary as its foundation. It was 
secession in all but name. To escape such impossible 
results, the English government abandoned nearly all 
the oppression that had made revolt in Ireland a ne- 
cessity. In ten short years, under Parnell's lead, the 
Irish people made a progress, politically, socially, 
and in material, that had been accomplished in no 
century preceding. 

The secret of Parnell's power is strangely hidden. 
His character had the charm of profound mystery, 
his career the fascination of the picturesque. With- 
out the qualities of an orator, he won through his 
oratory. Cold as an icicle, and almost repellant in 
his solitary ways and silent reserve, he had the most 
enthusiastic following and wannest friends that ever 
blessed -and sustained a popular leader. St. Patrick 
was not more reverenced nor the Holy Father more 
implicitly obeyed. 

Was ever greater power given one man ? In his 
place among his peers on the floor of the commons, 
he was regarded with admiration or hate, but ever 
with a tinge of awe and fear. It was felt that the 
same hand that guided all Ireland, so strangely, held 
in control the darker and more desperate elements 






414 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

of that turbulent people. Ever along the ragged 
edges of the slate-tinted cloud played the silent light- 
ning of assassination. "While patriotic and poetic 
under the Roman robes of a Brutus, or the graceful 
drapery of a Charlotte Corday, to strike for freedom, 
it was atrocious in a dirty peasant driven to despera- 
tion, by his houseless family famishing for bread, to 
strike down his immediate oppressor. Recognizing 
his proud pre-eminence, his fame and name went out 
over all the civilized earth. The millions of exiled 
Irish, scattered over our fair land, looked proudly up 
at thought of him, and all united in prayer in his 
behalf, and all from their hard-earned wages sent 
him great sums to sustain his poor followers and 
strengthen their patriotic efforts. 

In the very hour of his greatest triumph for his 
people, at the loftiest height of his brilliant career, 
he suddenly turned aside to commit the suicide of 
crime. Fame, fortune, power, all went out as sud- 
denly as darkness swallows night after vivid gleam 
of lightning. What remained was but the specter of 
Parnell. The pitiful struggle that followed was but 
the fierce anguish of despair. The world sickened at 
the wild, impotent efforts of the strange form that so 
resembled Parnell, and yet was bereft of all the 
grand qualities that but a brief time before awakened 
love and admiration. The immortal past of the great 



Charles Stewart Parnell. 415 

man was gone, and soon this thing would drop ex- 
hausted and be buried out of sight. 

The church in Ireland, in the painful emergency, 
acted promptly. How painful the act of condemna- 
tion was to the church no words have told, or will ever 
tell. The poor priests of that suffering land, robbed, 
abused, sneered at, and despised, found in Parnell 
their friend and champion. They loved their bril- 
liant advocate and brave leader. From every alter in 
all the island went up each morn heart-felt prayers in 
his behalf. To not only tear him from their hearts, 
but from those same altars anathematize the criminal 
they had so nearly canonized as a saint ; to rebuke the 
thronging thousands of his insane followers ; above 
all, to part with all that had been gained in the cause 
of Ireland, called for a fortitude and courage far 
greater than had been demanded in the darkest con- 
flicts of the past, for all the while there rang in their 
ears the jeering laughter that told the delight of 
their enemies. To condone the crime, to forgive the 
criminal, and bid him go on as the multitude de- 
manded, made a course that was not possible. The 
Parnell they sought to pardon no longer existed. 
The laurel that crowned the living hero, in his suicide 
of crime, but decorated decay. 

The closing hours given his mortal remains and 
the somber surroundings that shadowed in the last 



416 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

shock of agony were strangely in keeping with the 
solitary, mysterious career of this remarkable man. 
From that house, so close by the sea that the storm in 
the hoarse roar of the surf requiemed his dying mo- 
ments, while the rain and spray spit upon the win- 
dows and the wind shook the walls, no cry for aid or 
sympathy went out to a world that had abandoned 
him. Of all " who followed, flattered, sought, and 
sued," no one was found to hold his dying hand or do 
him reverence. Abundant are the tears and piercing 
the cries of anguish now from the multitude mourn- 
ing a dead chief, but the sad event they memorize 
dates back over a year, when the grand leader com- 
mitted the, suicide of crime. 

After all, the fact comes home to us that Parnell's 
death was necessary to Ireland's progress. All the 
good he did, and it can not be over-estimated, remains 
and will remain, and the only man who could have 
endangered the good accomplished was Parnell him- 
self. What he designed and what undoubtedly he 
would have attempted, the fulfillment of Ireland's 
dream of national independence, was and is a dream, 
which to realize would plunge Ireland into deeper 
woes than the unfortunate people ever experienced 
before. It is well for them that the holding fast to 
the good they possess, the effort at advancement 
should be conservative, and, therefore, practical. In 



Charles Stewart Parncll. 417 

this way the cruel tragedy that robbed Ireland of one 
great leader may make room for many leaders, all re- 
solved to take up what Parnell threw down, and so 
lift old Ireland to the plane her piety and patriotism 
make worthy of her. 



•118 Celebrated Men of the Day. 



James A. Garfield. 

This eminent man, looked at from a social point 
of view, was the most charming of men. His fine, 
healthy physique overflowed with animal spirits, and, 
added to this, was a keen sense of humor and a com- 
panionable turn. The fascination of his presence, 
however, came in on a defect. He was extremely 
sensitive and modest. He lacked entirely what 
phrenologists call self-esteem. With large love of 
approbation, that made him ambitious, he was with- 
out the quality that creates egotism, hence he had 
the subtle flattery found in the tireless practice of 
listening. 

In using these terms, because they make a com- 
mon language, the reader must not suppose that I am 
giving in adhesion to the so-called science of phre- 
nology. It is a snare and a delusion. Denying that 
the mind is a unit, and that using gives it diversity, I 
also deny that it presents a variety of organs, each 
one of which, carefully analyzed, constitutes a com- 
plete head, or, in other words, has perfect independ- 
ent power of expression. What is ideality, for ex- 
ample, without all the other intellectual organs; or, 
indeed, what is any one of the organs, or all com- 



James A. Garfield. 419 

bined, without the animal powers and impulses nec- 
essary to life and use ? The great Napoleon disposed 
of the so-called science when he said : " Nature is 
secretive, and never gave bumps on a man's head 
that a blind idiot could read by the mere feeling of 
them ? " 

Garfield recognized this. His explanation of the 
facility possessed by the phrenologist of hitting on 
the prominont traits of a subject was characteristic 
of the man, and told of one of his beliefs not gener- 
ally known. 

We were discussing the subject in my library at 
Washington. Garfield was telling George Douglas 
and myself how, when a young man, on his way to 
college, he stopped over at New York and expended 
five dollars in getting a chart of his head from the 
Fowlers. The ready bump-reader gave him the 
head of a Webster and Marshall united, and then 
said : 

" Young man, all these rare qualities are nullified 
and rendered utterly useless by the absence of self- 
esteem ; where that organ ought to be there is ex- 
ternally a hollow. You will make friends, but never 
a following." 

George Douglas laid his head on Garfield's knee 
and cried : 

" General, where is that bump ? " 



420 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

Garfield kindly put his hand on the head of the 
gifted young journalist, and said : 

" Young man, I would give a thousand dollars 
an hour for that development of your skull." 

The late President ascribed the phrenologists' 
facility of discovery to a spiritual faculty, since called 
mind-reading. He explained that when the operator 
puts his hand on the head of the subject, he fetches 
himself in contact with the mind itself, and utters 
what he receives. Garfield was a confirmed spiritual- 
ist, and extremely superstitious. " This life on 
earth," he was wont to say, " is but a shadow of the 
life we can not see. The immortality we believe in 
did not begin at birth, any more than it ends in 
death. We have been born many times, but we never 
did begin. To admit a beginning is to recognize an 
end. "With this mystery about us, how vain and 
foolish to make our life on earth the one sole object 
of our existence." 

He gave me many instances of the interference 
of a mysterious power in his own life; interferences 
that he modestly claimed did not differ from those ex- 
perienced by others, save in the fact that he recog- 
nized them. Of many of these strange events he 
told me, and I restrained from repeating them be- 
cause, being confidential utterances, they are, there- 
fore, sacred. On one occasion, noticing Frank, a little 



James A. Garfield. 421 

black-and-tan terrier, turning himself round and 
round before curling up for a sleep, he said : 

" Do you know why that little fellow goes 
through that ceremony before lying down ? " 

I professed utter ignorance. 

*' Because he came of a wild ancestry that 
trampled down the grass in that way to make a bed. 
We call that instinct, but the practice continues after 
the reason for it has ceased. How much of that 
there is in humanity which keeps up abuse long after 
any — I won't say reason, but — excuse for it exists." 

"To ignore a fact," he said, on another occasion, 
" because it is not dignified is stupid. All science is 
based on vulgar facts. We know that the earth is 
round because the ignorant sailor sees first the top of 
the mast of the coming vessel, and, after a time, the 
hull. Newton saw significance in a falling apple. 
Emerson calls Spiritualism rat-hole revelation. The 
Jews saw about the same of Christianity. It was 
born in a manger. If Emerson dared, he would class 
the manger with the rat-holes." 

Garfield had a seance with Slade. Before doing 
so he procured a double slate, hinged and locked, with 
a bit of pencil inside. He was a stranger to that 
stupid curiosity, Slade, who is a bad man, and scarce 
one remove from an idiot. Putting his slate on 
Slade' s mantlepiece, he soon became deeply interested 



422 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

in the strange manifestations that went on in the 
broad daylight. He quite forgot the precaution he 
had taken, and was about leaving when Slade said : 

" You have forgotten your slate." 

Garfield took it, and, going to his hotel — the 
Metropolitan — opened it, and found written in the 
center two words. They were : " Credit Mobilier." 

Garfield had all the affectionate nature of a child, 
with the sensitiveness of a woman. He was given 
to putting his arms about the necks of his friends, 
and calling them odd names. Jeremiah S. Black 
once said to him : 

" Garfield, you go into a fight with the horns of 
a bull and the skin of a rabbit." 

The able judge did not mean that his friend had 
the cowardice of the one or the brutality of the 
other, but that, with his power to hurt, he had a 
sensitiveness that made his punishment out of all 
proportion. 

One looks back at the Credit Mobilier affair now 
with no little amazement. Of all the congressmen 
implicated in the charges, blindly made by the press, 
Garfield suffered the most. It was, at the time, im- 
possible to be heard in his defense, or, indeed, to be 
heard in defense of any of the congressmen indicted 
by public opinion . 

Trial by newspaper is the most cruel and unjust 



James A. Garfield. 423 

known to humanity. A man is found guilty in the 
indictment. If, after his condemnation, he comes 
forward with his proof of innocence, he is pro- 
nounced a tiresome bore, for the subject has lost its 
interest in the loss of excitement. The only road to 
escape is to quietly live down the accusation. This 
Garfield did. When nominated, through accident, by 
a popular party, his record, of course, became the 
record of the party, and to question it is to get 
abused, or, perhaps, beaten. In the canvass no one 
attempted to defend the candidate. The whole thing 
was simply ignored. Yet Garfield was innocent of 
any wrong-doing, as was every other congressman 
implicated. 

Let us see : Oakes Ames, a wealthy member of 
congress, who stood high in public and private, said, 
for example, to another member : " I have some stock 
I am carrying for you. It is of the Credit Mobilier 
Company, which is a great success." 

The member said : " Thank you." 

It turned out that said company was a wicked 
contrivance designed to swindle the government. 
How was the member to know that ? There are not, 
probably, five men in the United States today who 
know what the member was supposed to know by 
intuition. Had the offer been made by a lobbyist it 
would have been different. But here was a gentle- 



424 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

man of recognized standing, a Massachusetts million- 
aire, and a reputable member of the House. The 
only victim who asked to see the charter and learn 
something of its nature was Garfield. The odd 
name of the company excited his curiosity. Credit 
Mobilier — what was that? The Hon. Ames was too 
cunning to comply with the request. Well he may 
have been. 

The name of Credit Mobilier was borrowed by 
George Francis Train from a French company insti- 
tuted by the Count de Moray. Train's corporation 
came from a Pennsylvania legislature, and was se- 
cured to cover a construction company for the Pacific 
railroad, that was being built on government bounty. 
The members of the Credit Mobilier were the direc- 
tors of the railroad, so that the contract for construc- 
tion was made by men acting in one capacity, with 
themselves acting in another, and so covered a tre- 
mendous swindle. 

The stock under this state of fact was of im- 
mense value. Messrs. Durand and Harry M'Comb 
discovered that Oakes Ames had taken to himself 
more shares than he had a right to, and undertook 
to blackmail him out of them. Ames knew, as well 
as they knew, that a suit would be fatal to all con- 
cerned, and so resisted. He told the complainants 
that he had placed the stock " where it would do the 



James A. Garfield. 425 

most good," and gave them the names of certain 
members of the House and Senate as the recipients. 
The object of this is plain enough now. If the suit 
was actually pressed to an issue, and Ames lost, he 
could account for the stock. If, on the contrary, he 
won, the stock would remain his, for he had not gone 
so far with his honorable friends as to lose their 
values, and they were important to him, for at that 
very moment he was on the verge of bankruptcy. 

Ames was right in his reasoning. The suit only 
went so far as to be put on paper, and the papers 
were carefully locked in a lawyer's safe in New 
York. 

Probably the affair would have ended there had 
not the New York Sun got an inkling of the trans- 
action, and, through some unknown means, possessed 
itself of and published the papers. 

The public mind was in a morbid condition. 
Corruption in high places had become so bold and 
shameless that an excited people demanded exposure 
and punishment. The wildest cry went up, not 
against the real wrong-doers, but the uuhappy con- 
gressmen Oakes Ames had sought to make stalking- 
horses of. It seems strange to look back now and 
see the man who openly avowed his intent to cor- 
rupt, who said he " placed the stock where it would 
do the most good," petted and sympathized with, 
36 



426 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

while the unfortunate victims were hounded to the 
echo. The Hon. Hooper, a solid man of Boston, and 
member of that House, although a leading director 
of the Credit Mobilier, not only escaped censure, but 
lived beloved and died lamented. 

Of all the men accused, James A. Garfield suf- 
fered the most. How near he came to suicide the 
world will never know. Eight after night the writer 
of this walked the streets of Washington with him 
till far past midnight, and I believe that, had it not 
been for Dr. Garnett and James G. Blaine, he would 
have sunk under the torture he suffered from the 
press. The high courage of the one and the skill 
of the other were potent to save at that perilous 
time. The way Garfield leaned on Blaine at that 
period left little wonder, on my part, that he called 
the Maine statesman to his side when he became 
President. 

The torrent of newspaper abuse that seemed to 
select him from all his companions, guilty as himself 
if any were guilty, as the one on whom to center its 
sarcasm and vituperation, seems singular now that 
this same press holds him aloft as a martyred saint. 

The lesson taught in this noted transaction is 
that the public likes to be bullied. The men, such 
as Bingham and Kelley, who came boldly forward 
and said, in the language of Statesman Tweed, 



James A. Garfield. 427 

" What are you going to do about it?" suffered little 
or nothing, while sensitive men, such as Garfield and 
Colfax, were fairly hounded down. 

Of like sort were the attacks on Garfield in the 
De Golyer affair. Messrs. Chittenden and Parsons 
appeared at Washington as agents of a wood-paving 
company at the time when Alec. Shepherd was ex- 
pending twenty millions on the streets of the capital. 
It was the interest of Chittenden and Parsons to 
magnify their services in the eyes of their employers, 
and so Parsons, having employed Garfield to make a 
legal argument before the Board of Public Works 
upon a contingent fee, the amount of which was not 
stated, Chittenden wrote the company that they had 
captured the chairman of the House committee on 
appropriations. Garfield was subsequently paid five 
thousand dollars as his fee. 

On this letter and fee Garfield was condemned, 
and yet it was not shown that he knew of the letter, 
or that any congressional action was obtained through 
him. On the contrary, the fact was patent that at 
the time of his employment as counsel all the appro- 
priations for the District of Columbia had been se- 
cured. It is true that the compensation seemed in 
excess of his services, but in these days of heavy fees 
to lawyers and doctors that ground of attack is not 
tenable. 



428 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

If the sensitive American people want to save 
themselves from such shocks they should lift their 
representatives above temptation by allowing a lib- 
eral compensation for official services. In a carefully 
prepared system of temptation through mean pay, 
they make themselves particeps criminis to the wrong- 
doing when it occurs. 

James A. Garfield had his faults, but they did 
not lie in the direction of money-getting. He occu- 
pied positions where he could have winked himself 
into millions. Instead of belonging to the noted 
many who grew mysteriously rich on five thousand a 
year, all he possessed when he was elected President 
was a modest little home, shingled in with mort- 
gages. 

A man of scholarly turn, his social habits were 
strangely temperate. He drank wine sparingly, and 
could only be lured from his library by a dinner party 
where men of intellect were found to make a feast 
of reason. He was a most charming guest at table, 
for his wit and keen sense of humor lived above the 
stimulants so necessary to the ordinary diner-out. A 
record of the nights when I have heard him talk 
with such men as Jeremiah S. Black, William M. 
Evarts, Henry Watterson, Governor Warmouth, and 
others of like ilk, would make volumes of Nodes 
Ambrosia equal to old Christopher E~orth. On such 



James A. Garfield. , 429 

occasions, and in his library, he presented a strange 
contrast to Garfield the partisan. As the last he was 
bitter, and author of the famous advice given to the 
Union soldiers, to vote as they shot. Personally, 
among friends, he was, to the last extent, indepen- 
dent and liberal. 

There is no difficulty in harmonizing this appa- 
parent contradiction, and that without detracting 
from the excellence of his character. Had the Demo- 
cratic party presented upon the floors of Congress 
the political doctrines advocated by Jeremiah S. 
Black, Michael C. Kerr, and others, at table, Garfield 
could not have well explained his opposition. But 
the Democracy, as a party, offered nothing but as- 
saults on the Republicans, and Garfield defended his 
organization. 

Once, when I charged him with blind partisan- 
ship, he said : 

" Yes, yes ; I know. But a man's party is like 
his own mother. One knows the dear old lady is 
not perfect, has a temper, perhaps, and is willfully 
unreasonable at times, but she is one's mother all the 
same." 

James A. Garfield was personally the most lov- 
able of men. His kind-hearted impulses made him 
promise, at times, more than he could perform ; but 
his efforts satisfied his friends, and left the friendship 



430 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

strengthened. There is but one act of his life that 
appears in strange contradiction to his character, and 
that is his letter to Secretary Chase in regard to 
Rosecrans' campaign, while he, Garfield, was Rose- 
crans' chief of staff. In common with his other true 
friends, I shrink from it, and can only hope that 
some circumstance, to the world unknown, existed 
then to justify the writing. 

Garfield's cruel death silenced all enmity, per- 
sonal or political. The calm, dignified patience with 
which he awaited the pale messenger, after he was 
wounded, won the love, as the horrible event awak- 
ened the sorrow, of the world. Without claiming 
for him the title of martyr— for I can not see what 
he died to maintain — I can see that he was a victim 
to a monstrous system of civil service, which our 
government had developed. High as he stood in 
the estimation of the nation, he is yet higher in 
the love and admiration of those who were so fortu- 
nate as to know him best. In their hearts is his 
truest monument, and it is to their loving apprecia- 
tion that the bronze and marble owe their grace and 
beauty. 



Richard Realf. 431 



diehard Sealf. 

It was on a strangely mild day in midwinter of 
'59 that I stood smoking a cigar under the porch of 
my father's house at Mac-o-cheek. This home was 
half cottage and all cabin, for it had been built of 
logs, while the Indians yet lived in the land, and the 
additions and improvements since had softened with- 
out entirely concealing its origin. I was looking, in 
a lazy, dreamy way, over the level, willow-fringed 
plain of the valley, when a strange figure seemed to 
lounge in on my field of vision. It moved slowly 
into nearer sight from behind a clump of lilacs and 
elders, and I saw that a wayfarer and a stranger was 
approaching. He had the worn, slovenly look of 
former circumstances. His broad-brimmed felt hat 
hung limp about his pale face and over his long hair, 
while his coat, dark, loose, and threadbare, had a 
touch of poverty's adornment in the fringe along the 
lower edges. His shoes, city made, had proved too 
light for the service required, and were in pitiful 
seams and holes. 

As he approached and ascended the few steps of 
the porch, I saw a slender man, of medium height, 



432 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

with a pale face marked at the time by a neglected 
scanty beard and a scared hunted look. 

Without removing his hat or dropping the evi- 
dent lot of soiled linen done up in a dirty handker- 
chief, he came closely to me, as I rose from my chair, 
and said : 

" I am Richard Realf." 

This announcement carried no light to my ques- 
tioning brain, but I started when he added, in a yet 
lower tone : 

" Secretary of State to Ossawattomie Brown's 
republic." 

John Brown — Ossawattomie Brown — who wrote 
the emancipation proclamation on the mountains of 
Virginia, long before President Lincoln's bayonets 
tore the compact with hell from the Constitution of 
the United States, had just been hanged, and the 
country covering a continent yet thrilled with in- 
tense excitement over the bold attempt of the fierce 
fanatic. 

Small wonder Richard Realf announced himself 
in a low, almost-whispered confidence, for all about 
us were men who would have hanged the secretary 
of state to the nearest tree with as little compunction 
as they would a mad dog. 

My response to this startling information was 
not dignified, nor very friendly, for I said : 



Richard Real/. 



433 



" The devil you are ! " 

Noting the gleam of fear that flitted over his 
pitiful face like a flash of heat lightning, as he half 
turned as if to fly, I more kindly gave him my hand, 
and asked him to be seated. He sank into a chair 
with a sigh 6f relief, and I noticed that his hand I 
held for an instant was not only shapely, small, and 
soft as a woman's, but that it was thin and feverish. 

" You need rest and food," I said to the poor 
fellow. 

"Yes," he replied, calling up a wan smile, "I 
believe I am starving." 

I seized the poor, little bundle, and, bidding him 
follow me, showed the honorable secretary of state to 
the guest chamber of the old house. Telling him to 
lie down, I made an effort to remove his wrap, and 
found the unhappy man had compromised by mak- 
ing his somewhat voluminous mantle do duty as a 
coat. He said, with a feeble smile, that he had been 
forced to leave his luggage in the keeping of a hotel 
man. 

Leaving him to rest while a meal was being pre- 
pared, I first took council with my brave little wife ; 
and after, at her suggestion, called in the family. It 
is said that a council of war never fights. This be- 
cause it is made up of men. Women advise fight- 
ing. They are the more combative in council, and 
37 



434 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

the women of our house were unanimous in their 
resolve to harbor, conceal, and protect the fugitive. 
My dear mother, an earnest Abolitionist, because of 
her Virginia birth and life, wherein her sensitive 
nature was pained by the cruel practices of slavery, 
warmly espoused the cause of Eealf, and proposed 
locking him in a huge storeroom we called purga- 
tory, for that it was without either light or ventila- 
tion. 

My honored father said little. When called on 
for advice, he merely remarked that, " as this gentle- 
man claimed to be secretary of state to a government 
that has evidently been hung, I think the better way 
would be to give him some money, and tell him to 
move on." 

My father had all the dislike to slavery held by 
the more humane Southerners, but, like them, he 
had a profound respect for the guarantees of the 
constitution. When. the South threw over the sa- 
cred compact, as my father held it, and appealed to 
arms, he sent eight of his name — sons, grandsons, 
and nephews — to the field, and to the day of his 
death remained an ardent and active enemy of the 
Confederacy. 

After the eminent fugitive had strengthened 
himself with broiled chicken, hot corn cakes, golden 
butter, fresh eggs, and coffee, the very odor of which 



Richard Realf. 435 

would revive the dead — and he ate and drank with 
the relish of a hungry man in good health — he seemed 
to pull himself together, and entered with zeal, and 
some cheerfulness, into the various schemes pro- 
posed by the sympathizing family, for his better pro- 
tection. The last one devised was to disguise the 
ex-secretary of state in the wearing apparel of an 
elderly maiden then doing service in the household. 
Realf laughingly assented to this, and added that, 
with a little dark pigment, he could use the color 
of the race he had striven so dangerously to benefit. 

The success of this, however, depended not only 
on the confidence and discretion of the servants, but 
as to whether our neighbors had observed Realfs ar- 
rival. 

This was before the appearance of that myste- 
rious pest known as the tramp, and wayfarers were 
few, and the country people, keenly observant not 
only as to strangers, but their own movements, per- 
mitted no one to pass without challenge and gos- 
sipy comment. We soon learned that our poor 
friend had not escaped observation, and before night 
set in more than one neighbor had questioned us as 
to the late arrival. An eminent politician at Wash- 
ington said of another, sadly entangled in the Credit 
Mobilier scandal, that, " when a man takes to lying, 
he should remember that be bas choice of lies, and 



436 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

select the one having the most truth in it as likely 
to give him the least trouble." We acted on the 
spirit of this wise axiom before we had heard it re- 
duced to words, and, putting our fugitive in a spare 
suit of my clothes, that required but little alteration, 
and cropping his somewhat luxuriant locks, we 
changed his name from Richard Realf to Ralph 
Richards, and introduced him as a distant relative 
from the East. 

We soon recognized that the man we harbored 
was a gentleman, a very courteous, kind-hearted, 
graceful creature, full of poetry, and loving romance 
as he hated real life. As to the ways of this hard, 
fierce money getting world, he was as innocent as a 
babe. Ere the end of his exile among us he became 
quite an exasperating burden on account of an utter 
indifference to the value of money. He expended 
our means with an ease and liberality so peculiar 
to the poets and long-haired patriots from down- 
trodden places in Europe. I doubt which, the fear 
of detection or the loss of his hair, gave him the 
deeper concern. This love of the locks he shared 
with the brother patriots referred to, but, fortunately, 
he differed in being cleanly. The European connec- 
tion between soiled linen and a sacred cause I never 
could comprehend, unless upon a suggestion once 
made by the witty Governor Tom Corwin, of Ohio. 



Richard Eealf. 437 

We were sitting together one night, listening to an 
eloquent, animated piece of real estate dwelling upon 
the woes of Italy. "The people may be cast down, 
but they rise from the touch of mother earth like 
the fabled god of old, stronger, and more terribly 
fierce than before," he cried. 

" I see, I see," whispered the governor to me ; 
"that accounts for it. They come up stronger and 
dirtier every time." 

At the period I write of, I had acquired some 
notoriety as a reformer, being the editor of an eccen- 
tric journal called the Mac-o-cheek Press, friend of 
man, that devoted its pungent columns to making 
itself disagreeable to despots in general, and the 
slave-holders of the South in particular. Dr. Gama- 
liel Bailey, one of the most suggestive minds of the 
day, had created the free soil party out of the old 
abolition cause. He saw the absurdity of a political 
organization, not only outside of the constitution, 
but in deadly antagonism to that foundation of our 
government. So he got up the platform which ac- 
knowledged the right of slavery in the states, and 
fought its further spread to the territories. Seward, 
Salmon P. Chase, the elder Birney, John P. Hale, 
Ben Wade, Charles Sumner, and the more practical 
men of the anti-slavery class, saw the wisdom of this, 
and so the little party was organized. It was a beau- 






438 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

tiful party as far as it went, or, to express oneself 
better, what there was of it. It had an unhappy 
lack of votes, and, being opposed to the selfish inter- 
ests of the masses, had small prospect of an increase, 
until the Barn-burners of New York and the death 
of the Whig party threw out of employment thou- 
sands of voters, who, to use the words of Daniel 
Webster, " did not know where to go," and so gravi- 
tated into the party that eventually elected President 
Lincoln. 

I refer to this, not only because it is a part of my 
story of Kealf, but because I note a tendency to-day 
among orators, editors, and historians to claim for 
the efforts of the then anti-slavery advocates the 
eventual triumph of their cause. 

Looking back now to the earnest and gifted 
men, a group of rare excellence in mental gifts and 
moral character, it is sad to realize how little they 
accomplished. Had not the fanaticism of the South- 
ern people blazed into civil war, we would to-day be 
hunting slaves at the North and hanging abolitionists 
at the South. The youthful enthusiast in the cause 
of reform feels at last, whether he lives to learn or 
not, that the intellectual processes in the advocacy 
of right seldom, if ever, reach the masses they are 
used to influence. 

A few statistics give us the fact and the reason 



Richard Real/. 439 

for this disheartening result. We have a population 
of fifty millions. Of this it is a liberal estimate to 
say that five millions are readers. Of the five about 
three read books, and all read newspapers. Of the 
book readers two-thirds are devoted to fictions that 
have no moral purpose or influence. The journals, 
or more properly newspapers, are what the name in- 
dicates, printed records of current events, mostly of 
a shocking, bad sort, and depending, as they do, not 
upon circulation alone, but advertising, for their suc- 
cess, are, of course, cautious not to offend by the ex- 
pression of views in favor of reform. Reform is 
ever unpopular. All wrongs lie in the consent of the 
wronged, and what with the fierce support of those 
who thrive on the abuse, and the dull, heavy, ig- 
norant conservatism of the masses, martyrs are 
readily made, so that we need not wonder that, hor- 
rible as slavery was, it had the press and the pulpit, 
the business interests and the selfish greed of the 
many to sustain and maintain it. So effective was 
this that the term Abolitionist became one of keenest 
reproach, from which men shrank, and even to this 
day it retains a part of its taint. 

The real obstacle to reform, however, was in the 
impossibility found in reaching the popular mind. 
At the time of meeting Richard Realf, I belonged to 
the class that believed when the argument was made 



440 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

the cause was won. I did not see that the argument 
was unheard, nor did I then know that for one in- 
fluence of an intellectual sort, even when heard, there 
were impulses born of passions and self-interests, 
that made moral progress impossible. 

Editing a newspaper favorable to freedom, that 
gained quite a circulation and no little notoriety, I 
found that its success was based entirely on its power 
to amuse. While stumping the state with Salmon 
P. Chase, I saw that where we had hundreds our op- 
ponents of the Whig and Democratic parties gathered 
thousands, and those two political organizations 
agreed on one point only, and that was in denounc- 
ing us as Abolitionists, negro worshipers, and alto- 
gether very vile, low fellows, to be shunned generally, 
and in extreme cases worthy of being hanged. 

I said to my gifted associate, Salmon P. Chase, 
one day : " The trouble with this people is their dense 
ignorance. Do you know, passing, as we do, from 
county to county throughout the state, that, leaving 
out the larger towns, we will not find a house with a 
book in it, other than the Bible and a medicated 
almanac ? What is the use of striving to move such 
a mass of ignorance by eloquent appeals ? " 

He responded, in his way, by calling my atten- 
tion to the progress made by humanity before print- 
ing was known, and that God, in creating man, had 



Richard Realf. 441 

made him self-sustaining, inasmuch as evil was 
temporary only, while good formed the solid founda- 
tion of all things ; that outside of book-making and 
mere intellectual efforts, elements were at work that 
would eventually triumph in the confounding of the 
wicked and the establishment of justice. 

His words proved prophetic, although the means 
were then unknown to this great and good man. 
Our enemies in plunging us into that terrible war did 
for our cause, what we could not have accomplished 
ourselves. Indeed, our part in the work was so small 
that it might have been omitted. 

Realf had struck the outer edge of the notoriety 
accorded me as a reformer, and walking nearly three 
hundred miles, mostly by night, found refuge in our 
house. 

I made a pilgrimage to Columbus, for the pur- 
pose of consulting Governor Chase about the poor 
refugee. I knew before he could be taken from Ohio 
to Virginia, a requisition would have to be made. 
The governor listened much interested to my story, 
and after some consideration, said he thought our 
alarm uncalled for. Beyond a bare mention of the 
name, and the fact of such an office as Mr. Realf 
claimed to hold, the governor had seen nothing. He 
thought as Virginia had hanged John Brown, and 
dispersed his followers, with the consent, if not ap- 



442 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

probation, of all men, Virginia felt satisfied, and that 
no effort would be made to hunt down so obscure a 
man as my friend Realf. 

We soon found that the governor was right in 
his view of the case. No detectives nor United 
States marshals appeared to haunt our happy valley, 
and the name of Realf disappeared from the press 
after such brief mention, that the public soon forgot 
that it had ever appeared. This seemed to annoy 
Realf, more than his danger had moved him. He 
not only assumed again his name, but had it inserted 
at the head of the Mac-o-cheek Press, as associate 
editor. 

The fact was, as I subsequently learned, that 
Realf had not then been identified in the public mind 
with Ossawattomie Brown's attempt in Virginia. 
The poetic tramp was, at the time of Brown's insane 
attempt, in Texas, and having imprudently revealed 
his knowledge of, and association with the feared 
fanatic, he barely escaped a mob by being arrested 
and taken to Washington City, in irons. The poor 
fellow suffered from both sides, of those who did 
know of him. The pro-slavery advocates thirsted 
for his blood, and the abolitionists, thinking that he 
had turned informer, were equally wrathful. Mr. 
Redpath, in his life of Old Ossawattomie, prefaced it 



Richard Realf. 



443 



with some pungent remarks, bearing on Richard 
Realf, which he afterward corrected. 

Realf fled like a frightened hare from the au- 
thorities at Washington, and while fleeing, read in a 
newspaper a further use of his name in connection 
with Brown, and fearing a new development con- 
necting him with the affair he plunged into yet deeper 
obscurity. 

It is difficult, at this day, to appreciate the excite- 
ment that followed Brown's arrest and execution. 
The North was shocked and startled at the daring 
attempt, while at the South there was a general belief 
that only a surface indication had been developed, 
and that lying back of it was a huge plot of a servile 
insurrection ready at any moment to explode. The 
women went tearfully, trembling, and in prayer to 
bed, while fathers, husbands, and brothers slept on 
knives and revolvers. One can not blame, nor 
wonder, for of all horrible things known to humanity, 
a servile insurrection is the most horrible. The 
women could well pray to God for protection to avert 
the awful calamity, for when it came there was noth- 
ing but a prayer for immediate death to escape its 
horrors. 

In making my poetic refugee an assistant pen- 
driver, I soon discovered that he had not the remot- 
est knowledge of what was needed in an editor, and 



444 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

equally remote information as to his value as co- 
worker on that sprightly emanation of journalistic 
wisdom. His bills and editorials were alike long and 
heavy, and while the one were shadowy and indis- 
tinct, the others were painfully near and palpable. 

It became necessary to discharge my associate 
editor. It was a painful duty, and to escape that I 
resorted to stratagem. He had a lecture written on 
Shakespeare, that he had delivered at Brighton, 
England, under the patronage of Lady Byron and 
other distinguished male and female people. I sug- 
gested, that next to the cause we advocated, I thought 
the people were most ignorant of Shakespeare, and I 
believed he could do well (the Lord forgive me) in 
throwing light upon the Bard of Avon, in the face 
of the public. 

To this end we had a trial at the flourishing 
post-town of West Liberty. Richard Realf 's lecture 
on Shakespeare had a successful run of one night at 
our nearest post-town. That Fourth of July desig- 
nation of a village means, generally, a whisky saloon 
and a hundred inhabitants, but in this instance it is 
a lovely little maple-shaded burg, nestled under a 
wood-crowned hill, overlooking the lovely valley of 
Mad River. 

It had, at the time I write of, but one hall, and 
that in the top story of the Ordway block, and the 



Richard Realf. 



445 



roof for a ceiling, and this slanting to the end where 
the platform was erected was so low that the lecturer 
had to be cautious in his gesticulations, lest he skin 
his knuckles, or bump his head on the plaster above. 
Lit with a few malodorous coal-oil lamps, on the 
winter night in question, and heated by a roaring 
stove, he had the beauty and intelligence of West 
Liberty to perspire and applaud an eloquent disquisi- 
tion on an immortal of whose work no one of that 
brilliant assembly had ever read a line. A select few 
of us supplied the lights, fire, audience and applause. 
To insure the last, armed with sticks and umbrellas, 
we not only led but thundered to such an extent that 
Ord way's hall was in danger, and the startled loafers 
about Cook's saloon and Brownell's grocery hurried 
in, filling the little hall and stairway with an anxious 
crowd, eager to know all about Shakespeare, anci the 
cause of this (to use a popular expression) unexpected 
"boom." 

The lecturer was delighted with his success. It 
had been gotten up on subscription, and the entire 
amount realized came in all to ten dollars and fifty 
cents, the ten coming from the pocket of the senior 
editor, and the fifty cents from the amiable post- 
master. The sum was handed the ex-secretary of 
state. Armed with this, and supplied with a well- 
stuffed valise, Richard Realf, ex-secretary of the John 



446 Celebrated Men of the Day. 

Brown republic, passed from our vision into the busy 
world never to return. 

While at our home Realf gave me, from time to 
time, fragments of his autobiography, through which 
were hints of a mysterious origin. His mother must 
have been a remarkable woman, for Realf was a man 
of genius. He told me of her taste for poetry, and 
how she had educated him in a poetic way, until he 
astonished her with verses of his own when scarcely 
able to lisp them himself. A knowledge of his pre- 
cocious turn coming to the ears of a lady — Lady 
Stafford, if I remember rightly — she took upon her- 
self his education. 

I learned subsequently, and not from Realf, that 
a sister of his, a servant in Lady Stafford's family, 
interested that literary woman in her brother's be- 
half. 

Elevated to this novel position, the wonderful 
boy became a pet of a Brighton coterie that included 
Lady Byron. Richard, having quarreled with his 
first patron, found in the unhappy, and somewhat 
hysterical relict of the noble poet another who took 
up the task where Lady Stafford dropped it, of spoil- 
ing the boy. He had persisted in publishing a vol- 
ume of sickly verses, in opposition to the advice of 
his earlier friend, and casting her off, swung to the 
skirts of the more congenial widow. 



Richard Realf. 



447 



The warm interest evinced by Lady Byron for 
this strange boy gave rise to an absurd scandal to the 
effect that Realf was an illegitimate son of the noble 
creator of poetic despair. Lady Byron may have 
thought this to be true, for we well know, since Mrs. 
Stowe's remarkable revelation, that the poor woman 
was quite capable of the wildest beliefs. 

Be that as it may, the noble patroness of a 
spoiled boy soon tired of her work, and gave the 
youth such treatment that he suddenly disappeared. 
He was not seen, nor heard of, by his friends, for 
nearly a year after, when ragged, half-starved, and 
quite ill, he appeared at his mother's house. 

He told me he had tried his fortune at London, 
like Chatterton, and like Chatterton, would have 
starved, but for a benevolent old baker, who donated 
bread to him every day, until his return home. 

The literary circle at Brighton, having won their 
elephant, soon wearied of their burden, and finding 
the poetic pet was inspired by Mrs. Stowe's " Uncle 
Tom's Cabin," and sought, as the friend of man, to 
free the colored race of America, they made up a 
purse, and shipped him to these shores. At that time 
Ossawattomie Brown was the hero of Kansas, and 
Realf, seeking him, offered his services. The rough 
old fanatic had no use for a poet, and so made 



448 



Celebrated Men of the Day. 



Richard a piece of fringe-work to his imaginary re- 
public. 

We never met after his departure from Mac-o- 
chee. I heard of him from time to time, once in 
the army, but the hearing was not of much encour- 
agement. A man of genius, with his delicate nerves 
outside his clothes, he seemed to have worried 
through a life, in a blind sort of way, leaving behind 
only a few poems to tell that he had ever been. 



THE END. 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: Nov. 2005 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 16066 
(724)779-2111 



^ 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




017 053 674 5 * 



